3-10-09 10 miler

This has been a bad week or two for workouts, but time crushing in on you has a way of motivating. My big race this year is only about 8 weeks off. I've been doing conditioning work since Jan, but it's time to get serious now - longer runs, and longer rides. Oddly enough, the swim really doesn't have me worried that much (hope I don't regret that statement).

Tonight I did 10 miles at the dam. It was the first warm run of the year, and the first time I could take my shirt off to run. It felt great to be our and sweating again. I ran from one end of the dam park to the other making sure to take all the side roads and spurs to add distance. I still had to do some doubling back (which I hate - phsycological effect), but only for about 1/4 mile to make to an even 10. There was no way I was going to end that run on 9.6 miles. I'm seeing more people at the dam, and as the evenings cool a little, the crowds increase...and so does the road traffic. I passed an older gent on a bike about 7 times. He was apparently racking up miles by doing 3 mile laps at the park as well.

Tomorrow is a rest day (from running - still gonna swim), so I figured I'd go long to give my legs a reason for recovery .

Now I just need to dedicate about an hour to making out the training schedule for the next 2 months. I'll try to get that accomplished tomorrow night.

I had hotdogs for lunch which has traditionally meant that I ran out of energy on any runs over about 3 miles. To combat this, I took a Gu before I started, and another Gu at around 5 miles. I also stopped for a while @ 5 to stretch a bit - I want to make sure my calves stay limber since they've been a little tight lately; that is probably due to the transistion from the treadmill to terra firma. I want to make sure I take care of that so I arrive at the starting line un-injured.

Time to start visualizing the race.