What a Difference a Day Makes

Finally.  A good day running.  Seems like it's been forever, though I'm sure I'm overstating the drought.

The slide began on Sunday, with what I thought was a disappointing outing on my 22-mile attempt.  Oh sure, I had reasons why I faded.  But none of that makes it feel any better.

Then, after an intentional recovery day, I missed a day.  Again, I shouldn't beat myself up about it. Afterall, this is a mini-"taper" week and I could probably afford to skip an extra day.  But mentally, it put me on edge.  It's hard to convince yourself that you're not de-training when you go more than 48 hours without a good workout.

Plus, I wanted to wash the taste of Sunday out of my memory, which is why Wednesday's lack of energy was so disconcerting.  It was only a treadmill run, but I felt slow and lethargic.  It was hardly a session that would make me put Sunday's run out of my head.  In fact, it seemed to validate Sunday's poor performance, and got me worrying about how ready I was for this coming weekend's half marathon.

Today went much better.  I did a little bit of everything.  Still used the treadmill because it's blustery and scattered rainy outside, but that gave me an opportunity to exercise some control over the workout.  I did an easy 10-minute/mile walk/run/warmup drill, followed by another mile of very light jogging, concentrating on form and efficiency.  Very easy.

Then, I busted out a mile and a half pretty fast, shooting for a 6:30/mile pace.  I didn't quite make it, but still broke 10 minutes, crossing the goal in 9:54.  I'll have to go back and check my log book, but I think that's close to my best 1.5mile time during the "modern era."  (Edit: just found a 9:51 from way back in May '09...can that be right?) After that, I throttled back to a steady 7:30/mile pace, and enjoyed the easier ventilation and slow down of my heart rate.  Normally, 7:30 can be stressing, but after the hard pace it felt like a relief.  I did half a mile at that speed, and then began a series of strides, "sprinting the straight and jogging the curves" on the treadmill's virtual oval track.

When done, that put me at 5 miles in 40 minutes and I felt really good.  I closed with a slow 9:00 mile, stopping only because my time was short and had to get back to the office.

Everything feels good.  Ankles feel good.  Hip flexors got a little tight, but I stretched out afterwards and they feel good now.  My "wind" and energy levels felt good too.  I hadn't done any speed play in awhile, trying so hard to build my mileage with long, slow jogs.  (Maybe that's not true...the All Day 25K involved some tempo/speed.)  I just think I enjoy intervals and shorter workouts of anaerobic threshold intensity better than the longer, aerobic endurance workouts.

Tomorrow, I have a notion to run twice: once in the morning and once in the afternoon.  I wrote yesterday or the day before that I want to take Saturday off in preparation for Sunday.  I want as much pent up energy and stored calories as possible.  But I want to at least be on the high side of 30 for my weekly miles, which means I need about 10 tomorrow.   But I probably won't have the luxury of doing 10 at a shot, and that might be too taxing anyway.  So I'd like to do 5 in the morning and 5 in the afternoon.  With the weather clearing, Miramar Lake might be a good option with Quin for the afternoon run.  And Maranatha's track is open in the morning.  Good.  No treadmill tomorrow.

I was starting to dread Sunday's race.  Now I feel motivated.  Yay!