Thursday, November 22, 2012

A little long...

I enjoyed a little 10-miler to start out my Thanksgiving morning. I woke just before 7:00, dressed and headed out the door at my parents' house.

To say it was windy would be a bit of an understatement. After an initial burst of sub-9:00 pace for the first mile or so, I bowed my head and resigned myself to creep along into the 20+mph blast. It was really slow going. There were times when my pace was barely under 11:00. I kept telling myself that the reward was coming. That kept me going along with my desire to toughen up my mind in preparation for another stab at 100 miles. My first 5 miles took 47:38. My average pace was 9:30 on the dot.

I turned around and immediately reaped the benefit of the wind's assistance. I was under 8:00 pace just like that! With no more effort! Needless to say, it was much more enjoyable running back. I brought my overall average pace down under 9:00. 8:54 to be exact. If my figuring is right, that means I was running almost a minute per mile faster!

The ninth mile had a little hill in it and I started feeling a little nauseous as I climbed it. Thankfully that passed after I ran over the crest and I finished out feeling much better. My time for the 5 miles coming back was 41:27 giving me an average of 8:17. (Firestarter, 10 miles 1:29:05, 8:54, 59 degrees, garmin data)

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