Thursday, October 25, 2007

Longer in Winter!

My schedule dictated my long run for this morning. Normally I would ignore my schedule, especially since I was up late last night moving a 75 gallon aquarium from one side of a very large room to the other. However, running has been going well with the lovely cooler temps, so as much as I wanted to turn over and sleep in, I couldn't quite make myself.

So One Hour Runner called for 49 minutes today, and yes, this is still long for me. I headed out with the intention of running 4 of my big loops, plus the hill back towards my house. If I was having a really fast day, then I'd have to tack more distance on, but that wasn't likely, and didn't turn out to be a problem.

I did have one problem. My first ever cramp on the run. I was only about half a mile in when my left shin suddenly started feeling very splinty. Then the calf cramped up and I started shuffle-hopping down the street. Very quickly the tension loosened for me to keep running, and within another half mile all of the pain and splinty feelings had completely abated. Not sure what to think of all that!

The most remarkable thing about this morning's run was my consistency in pacing. Every one of the 4 1.1 mile loops I ran was right at 12 minutes within a few seconds (erring on the plus side). 4 mile split was right at 44 minutes. Tacked on the hill for the last 2 minutes for 4.5 miles in 50 minutes with walking warm-up/cooldown making 5 miles in 60 minutes.

The colder weather definitely makes going longer easier for me. I feel like I could just keep running once I get started, though getting started is harder!

No comments: