Since the temperatures appear to be on an upward trend, I have shifted my focus for the base building to mileage and time on my feet rather than speed. My body does not do well in the heat.
Then on Thursday I decided to make that just a tad more challenging by signing up for the Great Virtual Run Across Tennessee 1000k. I elaborate more on Thursday’s entry.
Monday, 65 minutes, 7.28 miles
We got started a little later than I had planned and as has become typical for my runs recently, my legs felt tired at the beginning. I settled in after that first mile or so but this new trend towards starting feeling a bit tired has certainly helped build mental strength. I also have started to develop a thicker skin as it comes to dealing with the absolutely ridiculous amount of cars out on the road, so many that I had to raise my voice a little for Mom to hear me. A lot of people seem to have taken the ending of the stay at home order as, go ahead and go back to normal life. (I will leave it there.) After parting from Mom at the 50 minute mark I planned on 10 more minutes and started my typical “countdown.” (I look at my watch at street crossings and practice my mental math as to how many seconds remain.) When I made my second loop and looked down at my watch I figured the seconds that remain at 7 minutes rather than 3 and so decided to go for 65 minutes instead of 60 minutes. I felt great during that final part.
Tuesday, 60 minutes, 6.74 miles
Once again I felt a bit tired, although not as much as yesterday, when I started this run. When my legs sent that signal to my brain, I countered with a reminder of what I wrote about yesterday’s run. Eventually I forgot about the tiredness and settled into the run. Things flowed fairly uneventfully until we got close to the intersection about a mile or so away from our street, just before it actually. We saw a gentleman up ahead of us and started checking behind us to see if we were safe to run in the road for a little bit to pass him. Then he started running a little. I thought it odd but reasoned that maybe he decided to jog a little ahead and get over into the parking lot. He stepped into the parking lot when he got there but not that far. I gave him a little hand wave anyway as we passed. Then before I could finish my next sentence to Mom he came jogging around back in front of us. Nope. I refuse to play that game. We turned into the parking lot and ran way out of our way crossing in the street instead of coming back to the intersection. That got my heart rate up a little. We definitely finished at a faster pace than we would have otherwise.
Wednesday, strength training
I made it out this week! After a week off to get my grad work done, I made it out to Mom and Ellis’ house after battling far too much traffic. Wade Hampton “regular traffic even though we shouldn’t have that much traffic right now” reminded me just how much I dislike driving down Wade Hampton pretty much any time. Complaints aside, Ellis whipped up some rigorous additions to our routine getting quite creative with the equipment that he already owns. (He attempted to get some 10 pound weights from Walmart this morning but Walmart could supply only empty shelves. I hope those weights get put to good use!) Although we should have done two rounds of the work, one round definitely got my heart rate up.
Thursday, 70 minutes, 7.88 miles (1 mile walk after for #gvrat1000k)
This morning I ventured onto Instagram to work on another project and happened to see a post from a running friend of mine. In the caption he said something about getting another mile in for #gvrat1000k. Intrigued, I looked it up, fell down the rabbit hole, and ended up signing up for the challenge. I joined almost one week into the challenge so I have a little bit of catching up to do. The gist is to run virtually across Tennessee or 1000k over the course of the summer. This virtual race is put on by Laz (and a few others) of Barkley Marathons fame. It means getting in a weekly 51 miles, a step up for what I have run for the past couple months but not a leap so I think I can handle it. Since I find myself a little behind and not keen to jump my weekly mileage up quite that fast, I will supplement with walks for a week or so.
Either the motivation from the challenge or the fact that I have generally eaten better this week or both helped me tremendously on this run. I felt great the entire run. The slightly lower temperature did not hurt either. My stride felt strong. I felt confident and motivated, eager to get in the mileage. Great start to this challenge.
Friday, 70 minutes, 7.75 miles
So, somehow we ran a little slower today but I did not feel all that different. Scattered showers kept us fairly cool which I appreciated, not the showers but the temperature. My legs felt a little more tired than yesterday but not too bad. I did not get in an extra mile of walking thanks to the sprinkling showers and the later start to the run. Other than that, I felt good throughout the run.
Saturday, 2.23 miles for Ahmaud
Mom an I decided to move our long run to Sunday since she and Ellis laid the last of the sod for their yard on Saturday. Since I can’t seem to go through a Saturday without a run plus I did some bad math that made me think that I needed it to get to 44 miles for the week, my reasonable mileage step up, I decided to run. I also took this as an opportunity to get in a run to honor Ahmaud Aubrey, a black man tragically killed while out for a jog.
I felt good through the run, just focused on taking it easy and thinking about the purpose for my run that day.
Sunday, long run, 12.47 miles, (1.25 mile walk after for #gvart1000k)
Originally I planned on 14 miles but I want to make sure that I bump my mileage up to 51 per week responsibly so that I avoid any possible injury. Since I ran yesterday as well, I looked at the math and realized that 12 miles would suffice to get me to my 44 mpw goal. (I actually got to 45 but that’s pretty close.) Mom and I headed out and felt great the entire time. It was chilly enough at the start that my nose decided to contribute its own running effort. Thankfully that stopped and I did not have to worry about it after about mile 4. We kept the pace fairly slow abetted by our constant talking, mostly me of course. I really do enjoy these conversations and know that they help us deepen our relationship. I love the fact that we celebrated Mother’s Day by running 12 miles together.