A Tale of Two Runs

When my 5am alarm started screaming this morning I did anything but jump out of bed. I was TIRED. I stayed up a bit too late last night (Darn you, Dexter! You're too addicting!) so I was dragging.

But, up I got and out the door and was at the gym by 5:25am. Usually Tuesday's I go to Signature Strength, but since I've decided to forgo strength til post-race, I have Tuesday morning's to treadmill it up now.

I did 8.25 miles in 1:15:08 for a 9:06 average pace. I started slower... around a 9:30 pace, thinking I'd go slow and call them recovery miles, but I was feeling it so picked it up more and more throughout the run. I felt fast and strong. I was engrossed in Felicity and the miles really flew by. It was one of those great I-LOVE-TO-RUN runs, though it left me feeling B-E-A-T by the end, as I was pushing 8:20s by the end, and of course, I was just grossly, GROSSLY sweaty.

Before I knew it I was running late and needed to haul ass to the showers to get to work on time. After a quick shower and such I was out the door for work.

Work's been pretty busy lately. I'm teaching a class this semester and it's actually a lot more work than I was expecting, so staying on top of all that and my normal job is adding up. But, I loooove it. I'd MUCH rather be busy than bored. Any day. So, no complaints here!

Anyway- during my lunch hour I hit the indoor track for a few more miles.

When I got there, I told myself I'd do 6.25 to make it 14.5 for the day. Within the first mile, I started doubting the full 6.25 were gonna happen. My legs felt like they were filled with rocks and I just wasn't feeling it. I managed to convince myself to gut it out, but they definitely were NOT those wonderful I-LOVE-TO-RUN kinda miles. They were more like GRRRAHHHH-WHEN-IS-THIS-GOING-TO-BE-OVER kinda miles. My overall pace didn't end up sucking, and I'm not really sure how that happened. But overall this was definitely just a very MEH kinda run... at best.

Running is such a crazy thing. How can 2 runs of comparable length completed on the same day feel SO DRASTICALLY different? This morning, I was on cloud 9. This afternoon, I was so over being in my Brooks. Oh, running. Always keeping me on my toes. (Get it, get it! I'm soooo funny, I know.)