Early start, better run

Sunday long run today. Ten miles. I started much earlier than recent Sundays. I was up at 5 and on the rod by 5:40. The temp was in the high 60s and in the mid-70s by the end of the ten. I had a much better run. I've been wearing my Camelbak filled with Gatorade G2 and some electrolyte tablets dissolved within. Clif shots every three miles helped. I had a good run. In the first three miles I ran one minute slower than marathon pace. Since I am a slow runner, this was somewhere in the 13:00 to 13:20 range. In the middle miles I ran pace of between 12 and 13 minutes per mile. In the final 3 miles I ran under
11:30 per mile pace. I also took a couple of walk breaks to eat my shots, and later in the run to slow my HR, but I feel good about today. No injuries or issues. I still have a hard time imagining running 20 miles.

AWOL

Sorry to be so long in between posts. But there are some major changes about to take place in my life. First, we are planning to sell our house, which means (thanks to those clutter-obsessed HGTV jerks) I have ben cleaning the &^%$#(*&^% out of my house. We rented storage space to "stage" the house and make it look bigger than its 1599 sq. feet. I am tired.

The house is almost ready to list on the market. And I am about done with the many home improvements. What makes me sad and embarrassed is that we should have been doing stuff like this while we lived here and not just when we want to sell.


On the running front, I ran 9 on Sunday in the horrible heat and humidity. Really must start long Sunday runs before dawn.
No ITBS issues, no Achilles issues. All is well on the injury front. To quote Costanza: "I'm back baby!"

Because of all this home-focused work, I found myself sleeping in for the last 2 Tuesdays. The clock went of and I turned it off and rolled over.

That's okay. I am learning that rest is just as good as a nice run, especially after we old guys turn 40!

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Have a great day.

Jane! Get me off this crazy thing!

My friend, Lisa, who is writing my training plan, also is a kiniesiologist and in the past ran a testing lab. So she hooked me up for an ECG and a VO2 test. We determined my max HR and more important, my Vo2 number. I only lasted on the machine from hell for about 11 or 12 minutes before succumbing. The worst part of it was that neoprene mask I am wearing, which measures oxygen intake and CO2 output, was horrible. It got really hot and felt like I couldn't get enought air--borderline claustrophobic.

As soon as I cried no mas, I felt I should have tried for longer. Anyway, my VO2 number is 40.2. Lisa tells me that for a 41 year old male, the predicted rate is 35. So I am in good shape in that regard. My ECG was clear, no extra beats, etc. So all is well. My body fat is 24%, most of that around the belly, which Lisa tells me is the last place for men to LOSE the weight. For men my age, the body fat should be between 15 and 19%. If my belly looks a bit larger than usual in the above image, I am wearing 12 ECG leads and a belt to keep them all attached to me as I ran. So under the shirt was a bunch of wires, etc. In short, I am pretty fit for a still-overweight 41 year old runner.

Do you hear a banjo?

A friend of mine has recently caught the running bug and has been trying to hook up with me for a run for sometime. For a while I was on injury recovery and couldn't make a run with him. But a couple of weeks ago, we finally got together for about three miles of hills along a country road near the Parish line. This was a clay and gravel road that runs in many directions and crossroads and forks with a few rural homes dotting the landscape. Some of it is pretty and some not, but there are some nice hills, which Monroe just really lacks. So in the interest of fellowship and hill training, I met up with him and we drove for about 15 minutes to the location.

It was a pretty morning and not yet too hot. We took a nice easy three miles--he ran at my slow pace, so I would be able to converse. Not much fun when your running buddy is panting and spitting!

We were barked at by some dogs and a couple of good ole boys yelled something at us--I think nice things but really didn't want to stick around and see--and it was a rather uneventful run.

Two days later at church we spoke with one of the guys that tipped my buddy to the road and he said that he'd never run without a large group on those roads. You just cannot tell what some nut MIGHT do to two or fewer people, he warned. My buddy and I looked at each other and I thought us fortunate to not have had a "Deliverance moment." While we didn't hear banjos, there was a speeding truck that looked a little reckless and reminded me of the crazy postal driver in the 1988 Chevy Chase film "Funny Farm."

I guess the only thing to detemine now is which one of us would have been the Ned Beatty character?