A little procrastination

It's 1pm and I finished my long run, showered, ate, got some laundry started, checked out a few blogs and got myself ready to do a bit of work. Chris took Petru to a birthday party and then up to New Castle to visit his mom for the day, all so that I can finish up a grant that is due on Wednesday. So I made a deal with myself that I am going to write a little post, then work for 3 hours, then read for 30 min and work for 3 more hours before the boys get home. That should be enough, hopefully. Speaking of reading, I am currently enjoying Liz Gilbert's new book "Committed", which I think every woman married or thinking about getting married should read.

About the run...
I dilly dallied in the am, chugging cars and trains with Petru to sooth the guilt of having him spend the entire day with his dad. Around 9:30 am they took off for the party, I took off for my run. The plan was to do 17@8:26. The plan was also to stick with the pace, but that did not happen. I kept the average around 8:15 for the first few miles, until I got to the Fresh Pond loop which is packed with runners on Saturday mornings. Here is when I got in trouble. I did not want anyone to pass me, so I ended up pushing the pace so that by mile 11 after 3 loops my pace was 7:54. I headed into Belmont for the hills. This is where I died. A painful death. My legs felt like jello and I had to stop in the middle of the hills to stretch and catch my breath. After 3 miles of hills, with breaks, mind you, my pace went up to a 7:58. I took advantage of some downhills and got my pace down to a 7:55 again. I picked it up for the last mile (7:08) and finished with an average of 7:51. I would have been very happy with this pace but I took lots of breaks on the hills, so really, I have no idea what my real pace was (since I stopped the Garmin). Lesson learned, though. I need to keep the pace down so that I can do the hills at the end of the run. I just have to figure out how to do that. I also think that all the hills I did this week, along with the high mileage (47 miles for the week) left my legs glycogen depleted (even though I had a big dinner last night). I have to remind myself that this is so early in training, and I am actually running way faster than my plan is telling me to. If I manage to stay healthy, I am going to have a great marathon. Anyhow, I truly hope that all this hill work got me ready for next Sunday....

On a second thought, I don't think anything would have gotten me ready for this race. It's going to be a slow, painful, quad stubbing, nauseating death. At least it's going to be in great company - I hear this is the race of the beautiful and fit. Lets hope the weather will be as great as today!



Moderately challenging? Are you KIDDING ME?