Friday, August 20, 2010

Running Recap (8/13 - 8/19)

Looks like its just about crunch time, 3 weeks left until the Half!

It was a pretty decent week, which included two 8 mile runs. One short 1.7 mile (which was shortened by heavy downpouring rain, yes, got drenched!), and an early morning 3 miler (this morning!). Both 8 milers came on relatively cooler and very low humidity days, which made them possible to begin with. What I realized from those two runs is that, given similar weather conditions, its not my conditioning and/or lungs that will prevent me from finishing (or at least finishing with a respectable time), its my legs. Anytime I surpass the 6 or 7 mile mark, everything starts to ache. From the balls of my feet, ankles, knees, and the newest one, my right hip flexor. This is what I get for not being as diligent with yoga as I had planned. But I completed both 8 milers in about 1:30, so that realistically puts me in the 2:30 range to complete the Half. Not what I wanted, but hey, as I have said before, I'm just looking to finish (in one piece!) at this point!

I cannot believe I actually peeled myself out of bed to run this morning. Got up around 6:15am, washed up, got dressed, and started around 6:30. All the experts recommend that you run in the morning, but man, it was tough. Even though the weather seems nice now, the humidity was around 75% this morning, which is trouble for me, despite the cooler temp.

So now its off to Maine for the week. No plans on slowing down the training though! Hopefully I'll get a long run in there somewhere. We'll be doing  a bit of biking, so at the very least, I know I'll stay active through the week.

Here is the route from this morning, courtesy of MapMyRun.com

Friday, August 13, 2010

Running Recap (8/6 through 8/12)

I ended the last post saying I may be ambitious and do 7 miles. Well, I didnt, I did 7.5! Hah! We've been having some great weather, and that day in particular, felt really good. So I did the full 6 in central park, and when I got back down to 59th, I decided to do a bonus lap on the southern loop. But right as I got to the 7.5 mile mark, my legs were completely exhausted.  I could not take another step, even if i wanted to.  And to my surprise, my lungs were actually ok. If my legs would have cooperated, completing the southern loop at the end would not have been a problem.  I'm still at a snail's pace, hovering around an 11 min-mile for the longer distances. But hey, at this point, I'm just looking to finish this half-marathon. Which, by the way, is in exactly a month from yesterday!!

Sunday 8/8 turned out to be a nice day, so went for a quick 3 miles at the Cross Island path. That turned out to be harder than I had anticipated, given the conditions. But I got the run in, and thats all that mattered. The next day, 8/9, I had planned to do just another 3 miler (twice around the southern loop, central park), since it was near 90 degrees and humidity was moderate. But as I head out, it seemed cooler and less humid than was forcasted. I still set out for my 2x around, but as I'm finishing up the 2nd lap, it felt SO good, that I did an extra 3rd lap, for a total of 5.2 for the day.  And really, I felt like I could have kept on going! Great run for the day.

And then theres Wed 8/11, I'm not even sure what my plan was, but it was a complete off-day. My legs felt the slight burn in the beginning, which is completely normal as I warm up. But, as I'm approaching the end of the first lap, the burn was still there, and I found it hard to breathe. It was warm and humid, and the sweat was dripping off my arms! So, I completed the loop and called it a day. There was really no point in furthering that run.

So, tomorrow (8/14) is looking to be a really nice temperate, low humidity day...so again, going ambitious. The plan is 8.  We'll see how that goes....'till next time!

Friday, August 6, 2010

Running Recap (last 2 weeks)

The weather has become more bearable as of late, so have somewhat been on track. Though still not going out as frequently as I like, the sessions are getting better. Since last update, I've only had 3 runs, of 5, 6 and 6 miles each, with no breaks in the second 6 mile day.  The second one was also run 4 min faster than the previous one, which I'm sure the lack of breaks had something to do with. Nothing really of significance to note....

Mixed in there was an all day softball tournament, which left me pretty sore (surprisingly) the following day or two. 

On my last run, I tested out the iMapMyRun app on the iPhone, and I really like it. It'll map your route as you run (using the phone's GPS), and record information such as time, pace, speed and your mile splits; it can also give live updates via twitter or facebook, which for a geek like me, I find to be a really nice touch. The splits is what was sorely missing from Nike+ (if it does tells have that information, someone please enlighten me!). I feel like thats such a basic yet important stat, and have a hard time believing that its missing from Nike+. iMapMyRun then syncs to your account on mapmyrun.com, and logs all your information. The site even shows the elevation of your route. I've only used it once so far, but I really like the app.  I'm still using Nike+, so it was a bit tricky starting both apps on the phone before starting my run.

Was planning on doing another 6 miles tonight, but as the weather is looking to be really good this evening,  I may be a little ambitious and up that to 7. We'll see.