Friday, August 5, 2011

Training - Week 11 - Week 9 of Marathon Training - Friday - 5 Miles

I overslept twice this morning. I just could not get out of bed. Finally, at 7 I forced myself out of bed and strapped my gear on to run. I was out the door around 7:20 with a cup of coffee in my belly. I set out to run 5 miles knowing full well that my legs were cashed from the 16 miler yesterday.

I started off very slow as my quads were on fire and my legs felt like someone filled them with cement. After the first mile my legs loosened up and I just got into a nice stride to finish off the run.

The worst part of the run was that I swore I have ran this little course before and I got to my one landmark where I know that I have exactly 1.1 miles left to my house. I got to this point thinking that I was over the 4 mile mark giving me a little distance to walk to my house and relax. However, when I looked at my watch I was only 3.4 miles in and therefore had a whole .5 mile left after completing what I thought was a 5 mile route. Talk about a blow to the head mentally. I just picked up the pace and ran to get it done.

For these shorter runs of 10 and under I am working on running at my desired pace for the Clinton Half Marathon coming up. I have not ran the course nor seen it, but I heard it is very hilly. Aside from that I would like to run at a 8:05 pace finishing the half in 1 hour 46 minutes. I need to start gaining a feel for that time and pace.

All in all a good run as I knocked out the 5 miles in 39:44 which is a 7:56. This includes the super slow 8:39 mile pace of the first mile and 7:59 pace of the second. My legs feel better and I am ready to tackle the day striving towards GETTING IT DONE!

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