Saturday Sound-Off

I got up early this morning to fit my run in again. I love the sunrise runs. I was surprised by the cold though. Luckily, my mom had mentioned last night that it was supposed to be in the 40s this morning, so I was prepared...sort of. I have to say, I kind of threw this run together. I did put out my clothes last night, but that's about it. Tights, a tank, arm warmers and a visor...and I threw on a lightweight jacket at the last minute and never had to take it off. My lightweight gloves and a BondiBand for my ears might have been a good addition though, but it wasn't horrible without them.

It still took me almost 20 minutes to get out of the house. I was sure one of the little ones would wake up and then I'd never get out of there. Luckily, they didn't. I tried the new Gatorade Fit Prime energy bites before I ran along with a half of banana. I don't usually eat before my runs during the week, mainly because I run so early. On the weekends, though, I try to get a couple hundred calories down while I'm getting ready. I only had one of the bites (about 50 calories). I liked it...not too heavy but it felt like enough. I think I'll try another flavor though; I wasn't too fond of the cranberry pistacchio. They really should warn you that there is wax paper on both sides of the bites though :)

I thought I had my Garmin programmed for pace alerts. Well, actually, I did have it programmed for pace alerts...I just misunderstood what that meant. I wanted it to tell me when I fell below a certain pace, and instead, it beeped at me when it hit the splits for that pace for mile. Yeah, that's as clear as mud. What I mean is that it beeped at 9:40, 19:20, 29:00, etc. That didn't help so much since once I fell behind, I was always behind. I'll have to work with that this week. I'd like to set it to beep at me anytime my pace falls below 9:40 (or so) so that I can hit my sub-60 goal for this weekend's 10K.

Which I missed. Again. I ran a 10K this morning in 1:02:36. I am getting faster...I'm just not getting faster fast enough. I do pretty decently through the first couple of miles and then the last couple. It's those middle two that are a serious struggle. I think I lose my mental toughness there...my focus goes, quickly followed by my form. Once I realize that I'm slowing down and only have a little left to go, I can focus again and fix all the issues (the bouncing, arms swinging across my body, etc.).

I'm going to work on that the mental aspect his week so that I can really hit this weekend's race with all I've got. I know I can do this.

Anyway, here's the weekly mileage:
Weekly: 18.7 (one of my highest totals outside of my half training)
YTD: 300.7 (look at that! 300 miles this year!)

Post your totals! Happy running!