Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Sidewalks, bike lanes and flatness

This week I've been in West Sacramento. Yesterday I only had to go 12 miles and today 3. No hills, sidewalks, AND ginormous bike lanes!! And if there aren't either of those, the shoulders are decently wide...at least where I was running. Holy cow, running in West Sac is so...safe...and nice! On one particular street I ran, if it wasn't for the picture of the bicycle on the asphalt I would have thought it was another car lane. I could have lied down across it and still been clear of car traffic, it was at least 5 and half to 6 feet wide not including the sidewalk. The bike lane itself was the size of a two way street where I'm used to running. So spacious.

Yesterday I tried taking my water bottle belt instead of my back pack. I never learn that that thing is awful. I should have just taken my back pack. I put tape around the bottle to make it thicker so it would stay in its holster a bit better and did a few "practice" jaunts with it to make sure the bottle wouldn't fly out, and it seemed to stay put, but sure enough once I started running for real, it popped right out of the holster. So annoying. I decided to just carry it in my hands until I drank half of it (once it's half empty it stays put just fine) so I ran with a full water bottle being passed between my hands for about 4 miles. After a while my arms started to get tired of holding it and I figured I really only needed about half that water anyway if I wasn't going to drink much my first hour, so I tried to dump 1/3 to 1/2 out only I accidentally dumped more like 3/4ths of it. Ah geeze. I knew I was in for a rough rest of my run. At least my arms got a break. I finished the first half (10K) in about an hour and 8 minutes which averaged out to just over 11 and a quarter minute miles. At that point I ate my energy gel and drank probably half of the precious water I had left. By the time I was finishing I was looking for sprinklers left on or an abandoned hose in someone's yard or something. It was awful. I finally did find sprinklers on in a yard, but I was so close to finishing it wasn't worth it. I finished the whole thing in my goal time of 12 minute miles: 2 hours 24 minutes 3 seconds. I went 12.07 miles so really I made it in just under 12 minute miles. I'm happy with this, but I feel like I might have done better if I hadn't dumped most of my water like an idiot.

12 miles is an awkward distance for me because I usually let myself have an energy gel about every 50-60 minutes, so by the time I'm hitting mile 9 or 10 I feel like I need something, but I'm too close to finishing to justify eating another one. If I run 10 miles I eat one energy gel half way. If I run 12 miles I eat one energy gel half way...and it feels really hard at the end and I'm a little more worn out at mile 6 than I am on my longer runs at mile 6.

Today was my 3 mile (5K) run. I went 3.06 miles in 32 minutes and 17 seconds which is about just over 10 and a half minute miles. I was tired and it felt hard, but it was nice to not have any hills to fight with. I'll be back in West Sac next week and plan to go 24 miles on Monday and after that I won't go any more new longest distances. May is getting closer!

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