Yesterday's Run

...was a Long Run turned Semi-Long-Run for reasons that will be enumerated...

So, it was my mom's b-day. I wanted to do an early run (Honest!) and get out of bed and get it over with (I'm slow so 9+ miles will take me at the very, very, optimistically least 2 hours, probably), and then I didn't. I was kinda sure that I wouldn't be running. Why? Well, it's mom's b-day, as I mentioned, and she wanted people home - which is certainly not an unreasonable request - to help out with things, etc.

So, I was bummed that my week was going to be kinda crazy (as far as running goes) again. In other words, I payed little to no attention to the quality of my diet. Jeez.

I ended up eating a lot of (quite salty) tortilla chips.

I didn't drink enough water.

Later in the day, mom is like: "Don't you have a long run...?" and I'm like: "You don't mind if we go?" and she's like: "No! Of course not!"

So I guzzled some water (bad thing number 1, not including the late morning, the bad diet, and (dun dun) the chips) and we left. I drank some more water right before running.

At first, all was well. I did my warm up, got the Garmin all connected with the satellites, and started running.

Then for the first ~1.5 miles, I had a side stitch and couldn't run without horrible amounts of sharp, sharp pains. I'm sure we've all been there.

So my first mile was atrocious, as you will see when I put in the break down.

The next few miles, I picked up the pace, but the first mile had set me back so much, and the second mile wasn't so peachy either. I just knew that I couldn't do a long run. Thus, my mileage wouldn't be what it should have been for the week. Sigh.

As I went along, I debated at stopping at 2 miles. I actually doubled back for a second when I hit 2, and then went back again because I was like: "No way this is going to be a mere 14 mile week! Nuh uh!" so I kept going, trying to think about how long I could go and still live.

I had gotten some water at mile 1.7, and that helped. But I knew I couldn't do 9+ miles. At the very least, it would be too late.

So, it was humid, and hot, and in my dehydrated state, I did about a 50 minute 5k... which is really bad for me... anyway, I decided that I could do 4 miles. This would constitute a semi-long run. I could just switch my semi-long run with my long-run day and then it'd be cool!

Here's the thing: Sunday is a weird in-between day for me. It's both part of next week and part of the current week. It's the way my brain is wired; probably because I'm Jewish... so, anyway... technically this means that I've been getting in 2 long runs a week in, and also only 1... so yeah... weird...

I finished mile 4 like a champ! Well, imho. I made sure to get those miles in! I didn't stop at mile 3.95 when I got to my car because of a very slight miscalculation. I didn't even walk the last bit. I jogged around the fire hall parking lot until I hit 4.0 and some change. Booyeah!

So, I felt horrible, I finished strong. That's what counts, right?

When I was about halfway through the run, I was thinking to myself: "How am I ever going to finish a marathon like this? What if I get a side stitch then? OMG! My first marathon is, to me, going to be like an ultra, for pete's sake!" This may or may not turn out to be true. I'll let you know in ~9 weeks...

Break down:
Warm Up: Lunge Matrix
Mile 1) 17:19
2) 15:37
3) 14:52
4) 14:31
last 8.38 ft (hehe)) 1:42 @ 14:54 pace

And when I plugged that into the Garmin program, I'm like: "Hey look! Negative splits!" hahahaha

So, there it is...