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Runtime Error: Maybe they all had walkers cause they just ran 20 (twenty) miles?
I suppose this is my first ever "real" 20M run since two weeks ago I was huffing and ended up with 19-and-change when I ended up back in front of my apartment. Last weekend was a much more pleasant 18M (finished strong and feeling like I could have done more!) Today's 20M was fine, and if anything I was a bit bored in spots, but once I got home I feel like my body seized up a bit and I expect I'll be spending some time with the foam roller later tonight and tomorrow.
Right now my personal wall seems to be somewhere between the 17-18 mile mark. It's not terrible, but I wonder how much I might slow per mile after that point. These weekend runs are of the long and "slow" variety (I'm training with the ultimate goal of an 8:18 pace) and the thought of dropping an average of about 30seconds per mile AND adding another 6.2 on the end makes me want to vomit.
It's not the cardio/endurance end of things. That seems to be fine. I may start using my heart-rate monitor and start tracking that. But my muscles feel like they weaken dramatically, like it's all bone-on-bone pounding the pavement. I guess I could review my fueling but I am pretty confident I am doing it right.
But I have 11 weeks of training left and this is why we follow a plan, right? And I stick to it with a level of OCD I believe is commendable. I've always been able to race at or better than my target pace following this style of plan, so I need to get over this mental hurdle and put my trust in FiRST.
This OCD doesn't allow me to stop on my runs . . . other than for the approx 8 (eight) street crossings I encounter. To stop is to fail. To stop is to throw all 6 (six) previous weeks of training away. Stopping is week. And it's a shame, because after running good chunks of this route at least every weekend for the past year I'd love to take some pictures of the spots I have an affinity for, my benchmarks and mile-markers, the unique things that I see.
For instance, the 25 (twenty-five) or so elders with walkers that were peppered along the path somewhere out in Watertown. A sight so surreal to my oxygen deprived brain that it compared only to the time that Q and I saw a number of midgets climbing out of a manhole in the theater-district.
Perhaps when the weather is a bit nicer I'll take my bike out on the path (I don't care for riding my bike on the path when there are beautiful full-sized roads all around us) and take some photos.
Or maybe it wouldn't kill me to stop a few times here and there.
No . . . no, it probably would.
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