The earliest run ever

Never a dull moment this week during week 1 of 50 Miler training.

Tuesday was the most boring track workout ever. We were supposed to practice race pace, so, along with some warm up and cool down intervals, the gist of the workout was 4-5 miles at race pace. Around the track. With a 400 jog in between. Please shoot me.

I like using the track for speedwork, but just doing mile repeats around it is super boring. Luckily, my friend Jill was there, so I chatting with her made it bearable. Towards the end, all of the sudden, sheets of rain came down. It looked like Kari's race last Sunday (at least based on her pictures). So at least that was exciting.

Wednesday I did my first bike speedwork. Lily and I met the Baltimore Area Triathlon Club at Lake Montebello, a local running/biking spot that consists of a flat, 1.4 mile loop. The girl in charge put out signs a quarter mile apart, and we did 1/4 mile sprints, 1/2 mile sprints, and mile sprints. I underestimated the crap out of this one, it was freakin hard and my legs were killing me by the end. 

I wanted to turn it into a brick workout, but I didn't have time to run before work, so I solved that problem but just going straight to work without showering, and running as soon as I got home. 

No shower in between biking/running = brick workout = terrible five mile run with lead legs. 

Don't judge. Biking doesn't get me sweaty like running does and I have no air conditioning at work, so I sweat profusely anyway. And it's not like I wore my bike shorts to work.  When they provide me with a work environment that doesn't violate my basic human rights (air conditioning, regular bathroom breaks, and cockroach and mouse free), I'll be happy to comply with basic hygiene standards. 

This morning was just ridiculous. I was out of bed at 3:15, at Jackie's at 4, and running by 4:15 am. I am going out of town (what else is new) this weekend, and my friends Jackie and Mike have stuff going on, so we all agreed to do our long run before work today. Unfortunately, this week's long run was 17 miles. To get that in and get to work on time, we needed to start at an ungodly hour. 

I normally take my rest day on Friday, before my long run Saturday. Therefore, the smart thing to have done would have been to take my rest day on Wednesday, before my long run on Thursday, not do a tough biking workout and THEN run. But, as we all know, I rarely do the smart thing, and my legs paid for it on this run. I love teaching third graders instead of first graders though, because they can read by themselves, and I am free to do calf stretches. Totally worth the pain of a 3:15 wakeup call to have awesome company for my run, as per usual.

We did a 12 mile loop around the harbor, and were headed back to Jackie's, so Mike could leave for work, and we could finish the last five miles. However, a train decided to come to a dead stop in our path. After waiting for a minute or two, we took matters into our own hands.

 

I didn't really pay much attention to what the train looked like at 6:30 am, but look at the fun surprise graffiti I discovered when I got home!

Wish this picture wasn't so blurry - it really shows how awesome we are pretty well. 


No idea how I'm going to do long run #2 - 11 miles - tomorrow. Especially since tonight we're headed to our softball end of season crab feast in a few minutes. MMMM.....crab.


Speaking of food, I know this sounds ridiculous, because it's only been four days since I've officially been "training" for the 50 mile race (I put that in parenthesis because so far I really haven't done anything different than I would have done for marathon training), but I swear it's messing with my appetite. Yesterday I ate lunch and ten minutes later I felt like I hadn't eaten in a week, and had to get a ton of snacks to make it through The Help. (PS - the movie is almost as good as the book - go see it ASAP).  

Today, I couldn't even finish my lunch - which is really weird, because when it's just me making lunch for me, I can usually pretty much judge how much I want to eat, and never have lunch leftovers. I'm thinking maybe the extra biking is what's actually making the difference.