Yes, that quote from Cage the Elephant's "Aint No Rest for the Wicked" pretty much summed up my day and my run. Good song too!
Well, the pre-4am hour dawned extra early today and I spent a good 5 minutes in bed whining in my head and feeling sorry for myself that I am a top-college educated person with a legit full-time teaching job, yet I still have to work a second job to make ends meet. Then, I got over it and got out of bed. Lol. My legs were not really sore, but felt super tired from yesterday's 14 total miles with 3x mile repeats at night. But, I view tiredness as a good thing. Means they were working hard!
It was a bakery morning, followed by the customary speeding commute to teach while changing in the car. Classy. Teach x 6 classes (made my middle school girls run today in gym...too funny!) then a staff meeting. It was near 5pm when I got done, and the thought of traffic was unbearable. So, I did what I usually do and pulled into the nearest parking lot by work, changed, and was off!
I knew my legs would be sluggish from yesterday's speedwork + my 12 hour workday, so I gave myself permission to go SLOW and SHORT. I had no pace or distance in mind, just decided to feel my way through town and hopefully get back to my car eventually. I decided to check my mile splits as they came, which I don't usually do, but I wanted to make sure I was going slow enough. Honestly, my legs felt totally dead. I felt embarressed because I was sure I was going so slow and cars were probably pointing and laughing. I missed my first mile split, but looked down in time to catch mile 2. I prepared myself to see upper 8's....
7:42.
Seriously, you would think after running my whole life I would be better and knowing what pace I'm at. Honestly, it felt so slow and easy! I decided just to 'maintain' and not push my effort or not slow down and see what happened. I tried to keep everything really light feeling.
Mile 3: 7:42
And so they remained in the 7:40s for a few miles. It didn't feel hard, but I could tell that my legs weren't recovering necessarily. The route was very scenic, slightly hilly, but not too bad. Only bad when I ran out of sidewalk and was sandwiched running between overhanging trees and rush hour traffic for awhile. Ha. I made the decision at the 6 mile mark to run 10 miles. But, I decided that I would push mile 7, then force myself to do the last 3 easy.
Mile 7: 7:29 Sooo happy!
I stopped and reset my Garmin at this point. I had done 7 miles at 7:44 pace which I was pumped about considering yesterday and my day today. And how easy it felt. I told myself to do 8:30s for the last 3 miles. They ended up being 8:17, 8:22, 8:06. And since I was 'forcing' myself to slow down, they seriously felt like 9:30s.
So good run. I'm trying to appreciate it because I have been whining about my bad runs lately. This week has been good though, so I'm hoping it continues. Tomorrow I am REALLY making myself go easy because I want to be fresh for my last 20 miler this weekend. Yes, that is the plan.
And the best part....it was 6:30pm by the time this was all over. Traffic = gone. Drive home = 40 minutes rather than 60+ minutes. Yesss indeedy. I am easily pleased.
My stupid legs are still twitching like crazy! Time for me to slap on my compression socks and jump in bed! So excited to 'sleep in' until 6:30am tomorrow morning and not have any bakery! :) Again, it's the simple pleasures....
yeah okay. slow and short *eyeroll* hahahah! sounds like something i'd do (and HAVE done): say "it's okay to go slow because of xyz" but then bust out a killer run.
ReplyDeletefunny about the twitching legs! mine have been doing the same thing lately and, because of the cool weather, i've been wearing pants to work. and compression socks. it's amazing. i should start wearing them to bed again...