Hello 10 Mile Run!

Hello old friend.  I haven't seen you in years.  You make my calves and feet hurt.

Just kidding... about a 10 mile run being my friend.  The pain is real, though.  I haven't run 10 miles in a day in a few years.  My running group goes out every Saturday and does a long run together except when there is a race.  I have been running with this group since August 2010 and this was the first time I did the long run with them.  Late bloomer I guess.

I needed this.  If I was trying to run this by myself, I would have done one of two things and possibly both.  First, I wouldn't have run this fast.  I would have averaged at least a minute slower per mile pace.  Second, I probably would have given up after 7 miles.

There were water and Gatorade stops at different points along the way and that helped tremendously.  I stopped  at all of them.  They lasted 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 7 minutes, and 2 minutes.  The first break was like a warmup stop a little after a mile.  There were 7 runners in our group.  We split up into 10 mile and 12 mile groups at the first break.  3 of us stuck together for the 10 mile run.  The second pit stop helped me catch my breath around the 4 mile mark.  Within half a mile, I told the other 2 guys that I was going to slow down a little  and for them to keep going.  I didn't want to slow them down.  By the time we hit the next break around 7 miles, I was about 300 meters behind them.  I was toast at this point.  I drank up and stretched for a total of 7 minutes.  It was a little too long of a rest, because my legs felt a little stiff when I started up again.  I tried to keep up the pace, but could not do it.  I made my way about a mile and a half to the next water break, which I didn't see until I was right on top of it.  My left calf was cramped at that point.  I knew I only had a little more to go, so I pushed on.

Because I was tired and my calf was hurting, I started to alter my form for the worse.  I am a fore foot striker and started pushing my feet forward into the ground with each step.  This made my toes start hitting the fronts of my running shoes.  Not good, because I can feel the two long ones starting to bruise.  As I type, they are already turning red.  They'll probably be purple by tonight and black tomorrow.  Good bye toenails in a couple weeks.  All in all, I have 2 bruised toes and 3 blisters.  One of the blisters was filled with blood.  Those are always cool.  I am of the faith that popping them as soon as possible is the best medicine by relieving the pressure and therefore ridding the body of pain.

I plan on heading to Track Shack today sometime and signing up for next Saturday's race - Season's 52 Park Avenue 5.2k.  It is my first time running this race and since the distance is just over 5k, I am guaranteed a PR!!!

Summary of today's long run... 10 miles.  1:41 total time on the road.  17 minutes spent at water breaks.  Total run time:  1:24 which is an average pace of 8:24.

Long Run

I sat at my computer trying to map out a route that would be over 6 miles, but less than 8.  Click, click, click.  Undo last point, undo last point.  It was a lot of that for 20 minutes.  I've got my easy run, hill run, and tempo run loops all figured out, but the long runs get boring unless you try something different each time.  You need something to keep yourself occupied mentally... like trying to remember where you are supposed to make turns on your just mapped out route.

I mapped 7.5 this evening.  I cut a little off when I actually ran it and ended up with 6.75 miles in 1 hour.  I ran just under 9 minute pace.  I am pretty sure my endorphins kicked in around 5 miles, because that feeling like you can run forever took over and I was running with ease the rest of the way home.  If I knew that was going to happen, I wouldn't have cut the .75 out of my loop.

My goal was to run 6 miles and mission accomplished.  Next week's long run must be over 7 miles to make sure I am making improvement.

LD Run

LD or Long Distance run.  Sometimes you'll see people post LD.  It's short for long distance.  This is where you get the endurance in your training.

Usually, people will run these on the weekend when they have more time.  For marathoners, this is the build up runs while prepping for the longer distances while usually not going the actual distance of a marathon since that can break you down physically and you may not want to do that while training.  For a mid-distance runner like 10k to half marathons, you'd probably run about the same distance as your race.  If you are short distance runner like myself, long distance means more like 6-10 miles.  I run 5k's, hence the title of my blog.

I like speed work, but I have to work on my endurance.  You can take a world class sprinter like Tyson Gay or Usain Bolt and without LD runs, they aren't going to get good 5k times.  So that's what I had to run today.  I was supposed to run LD yesterday, but I felt that I needed to relax on the weekend, especially after hitting my goal time.

I got 6 miles logged.  I could have sworn it was more like 7.5 miles.  Nope.  Just 6.  It took me 58:30 to run 6 miles.  That includes my warmup miles, but still... if I can run in the 7 minute range fairly easy, then why am I running 6 miles close to 10 minute pace?  I will blame it on the heat and the humidity for now, but I need to see some improvement out of myself on these longer runs.