ouch

Still tired/sore from last week’s cross-country hiking/camping/rock climbing escapade, yesterday’s long run was actually quite painful.  An unforeseen series of events in the morning resulted in a slightly awkward start, too.   I planned to run early (8ish), so I had eaten a light breakfast at 7.  I also wanted to get new shoes beforehand.  So, I took a trip over to my local store and found they didn’t open until 10.  As a result, I ended up sticking around home/reading until 10, biking over to get new shoes, throwing them on, and heading out.  So, now it’s about 10:30, and I haven’t eaten since my light meal at 7.  Within the first two miles, my stomach was growling and I knew it was going to be a long run…I also miscalculated how much liquid I had/how much I could drink and when.  I finished my fluids with an hour left to run, and was desperately yearning for a drink at the end.  The food situation was actually okay, though.  I had my two Accel gels, and though my stomach was growling for the last half mile or so, it wasn’t too bad.  My legs/body, though, was quite sore and tired.  I think I’m still pretty beat from the driving/living outside last week. So, today I’m pretty darn sore. BUT, the good news is that I ran EIGHTEEN miles!  Ha, a new distance PR, and I’m stoked.  2/3 of a marathon!  And I think it ended up being at a pace of ~8:15 or so.  Also good. I had a lot of work to do last night, and didn’t do any of it in lieu of having a good time with friends.  While it may make this afternoon stink, it was really nice.  I do, however, have to get my things in line over the next couple of days, because this weekend is another “recruiting weekend” for the grad program.  I’ll be leading another hike and probably partaking in as many free meals as possible.   

buffalo burger = bad (b)idea

I wanted to keep the alliteration going there in the title, but I just couldn’t come up with a way to do it  properly…

Ok, so, two part update:

Tuesday I had a great speed workout… 400 m repeats at ~5k pace. I was being optimistic about my current 5k pace and putting it around 18:30 (A man can dream, right?). I figured running my speed stuff a touch faster couldn’t hurt too much. Then I ended up running consistently about 10 sec. faster on all the repeats! End result: training a bit harder than I probably should have. While I didn’t feel it much yesterday, I think it contributed to my crappy feeling today.

This morning was a short-ish (thankfully) 4 miles. To put it simply, I felt like crap. Last night I went out with my roommate and some friends for our weekly Tuesday night beer. I was in a super good mood, though, because I had just gone climbing and had finished my homework early. So, I had an extra beer (the mugs are huge… like maybe 20 oz?) and a buffalo burger with fries and all the fixins. That might not have been a bad idea in and of itself, but it was like 9:30 pm by this time. Needless to say, this morning I felt…. well, I felt like I had a huge buffalo burger and lots of beer in my stomach – heavy and dehydrated. Add an almost overwhelming feeling of being tired, and it was a long run. Lesson learned.

The next couple of days are 6 mile-ers, so I’m going to make a point of taking better care of myself

today’s lesson

One of the many things I love about running a lot is that you really get to know your body. If you’re willing to pay attention, you can really learn what each tick, tock, twitch, and pop inside your body means/is coming from/is trying to tell you.

Today, my body told me that I should never again complete the following sequence of steps:

1) eat breakfast at 6:30 am

2) eat a grapefruit-sized asian pear at 12:00 pm

3) run 6 miles at 1:00 pm

The result of my doing this was the most absurd, Pepto-Bismol commercial-worthy upset stomach I’ve experienced in recent memory.

A bowl of rice later, I’m starting to feel normal again. Thank goodness.