BALANCING ACT

It seems my ‘random thoughts’ posts are more interesting than anything else I’ve posted. Here’s a random question that I don’t know the answer to;

What’s the difference between salsa and picante sauce?

On the running front, it’s nice to finally be able to back up something I’ve talked about recently, like increasing my mileage. Friday I ran an easy 10 miles on the trails with some strides and then Saturday I managed 13 miles during our group run. That gave me 81 miles for the week on 8 runs. Believe it or not, that’s my biggest week since the first week in 2008 when I had 83 miles.

Saturday’s group run was the same balancing act that I’ve mentioned before. With a workout planned on Sunday, do I say ‘screw it’ and run with the group or take a more conservative approach? I ended up hanging back with Dan and ‘only’ running about 7:15 pace. The pace felt fairly comfortable, but I definitely didn’t want to go any faster for risk of having a crappy workout the next day.

I must have done something right because I felt really good for Sunday’s 16 mile workout which consisted of a 2 mile warm-up, 6 miles at MP, ¾ mile at tempo, 4 ½ miles at MP, ¾ mile at tempo, 2 mile cool-down. The only ‘problem’ is that my mile splits were all over the map due to 20+ mph winds. One mile I was running MP at 7:25, the next mile I was running 6:40. But I’m not going to complain as the weather is still incredible. Even though it was 70-75 degrees during the run, the dew point was less than 55 degrees.

Normally, I like to post links that I find myself, however, Scott found this interesting blog entry by Ryan Hall. From it I pull today’s quote of the day.

And I finally got around to posting another interview. Notice the great ‘stache!!!

Quote of the day;

“I had reached a juncture at this point in the run: either I could get discouraged with the reality that I am not able to think myself into sprinting up the hill or I could accept, and even relish, in the pain and discomfort running throughout my body embracing the pain as part of my mission. Then something happened that I have never experienced during any painful running session: a smile slowly crept across my face. It was kind of a weird reaction to have, but for some reason I felt very alive and there was a new joy that I found in simply going all out. It was a great feeling to know that I was pushing myself to the max, that at this moment I had looked deep into myself for strength and used whatever I could muster.” - Ryan Hall