Month: July 2010

Calf Cramp, Swarms, and 17.57 Miles, Oh My!

A calf cramp and running through a few swarms of evening insects didn’t stop my long run today. This evening I did 17.57 miles in Central Park in an evenly paced 2:23:10 (8:09s). The temperature for the first loop was 89, which eventually diminished to 86. It felt like almost no heat at all, though, because the humidity was around 35%. Here are the deets:

Inside the 11th mile, I developed some pain in my left calf. At first it felt like the calf injury I sustained recently creeping back up on me. It actually got me to stop to stretch it (Ouch!), then stop soon after to stretch it (Ouch!). While I considered dropping out of my run after the second lap, instead I treated this injury as a mental test to endure 18 miles (well, my 17.57) despite it. I invented a term for this kind of endurance: “despit endurance.” “Despit endurance” means “enduring despite something.” In this case, calf pain.

Other than that, and some mouth-filling swarms, the run in the evening had nothing notable to report. I ran after a 3-hour nap that came for whatever reason. I did two loops and my third loop was sans Great Hill. I finished at the light pole on the feeder entrance to the park. Over the course of the run, I stopped a nice amount of times to fill up on water. I didn’t weigh myself before my run, but after my run I weighed just about 169 lbs. I probably dropped about 6 lbs. today. And Garmin said I burned 2,440 calories in today’s run. I think for me that’s about a day’s worth of calories.

Tomorrow looks like a rest day. I will probably need it.

Someone Didn’t Tell Me It Was Opposite Day

Wow! I did the Central Park Conservancy Run for Central Park 4-Miler in Central Park this morning, and I did it fast! It was going to be a scorcher today but for some reason it didn’t feel as bad as I was expecting. It was 82 degrees with 53% humidity at the start. I say “Wow!” because I was not expecting wow. It was almost like Opposite Day, my results compared to my expectations . . .

I worked until 3am-ish last night/this morning, and only ended up with about 3.5 hours of sleep. While I did get pasta last night around dinnertime, I wasn’t eating that well and I was on my feel for hours at a time the last two days. I took a short jog to get my number but I was feeling dead. I figured, Maybe I’ll do this run in 32 minutes (an 8-minute mile) … I won’t push myself … I have nothing to prove here … this is just to run a marathon qualifying race …
Garmin Unofficial Results:

Well, well. I started off at a decent pace but realized I had just a little bit of speed with me. I figured it would leave or just taper and it did a bit, but not too much. In fact, my first two miles according to my Garmin were 6:40 then 6:46, which are quite excellent miles for me right now! I then ran a 7:09 through the hilliest part of this race, then didn’t keep track of my 4th mile, which ended up on my Garmin as a 6:33! (I had no idea I was that fast for that mile!)

The official results said I finished in 27:22. That’s a 6:50. My Garmin put me a little faster, but no worries: This is much, much, much faster than I thought I would run today. To think I would run 8:00s and then I go and run 6:50s!! And in this weather!!! With so little sleep!!!!

These 6:50s are a) a sign that I am improving in my running, b) a sign I’m getting faster, c) signal that I don’t need to worry so much about missing a couple of runs because of difficult work scheduling, d) make me happy and proud, and e) yea. I felt my left ankle a bit around the first mile marker but it never gave out. And the side of my left knee was a little sensitive, but more after I hit the gym for abs, glutes, arms, back, pecs, quads, calves, then abs again. I’m going to try to get a few hours of sleep now in order to catch up. But this is a nice achievement after a hellish couple of days of work. Woohoo!

And Then It Rained

Yea for rain! Today’s run in 82 degrees started off with about 60% humidity, though with all clouds and no sun, it didn’t feel nearly as humid as yesterday, which was about the same temperature. In my 6th mile, the rain started up, and the sky eventually opened up to soak me. Did I disapprove? No! I loved it. I did 8.11 miles today in 1:01:05, which isn’t that great given the 7:32 pace, but considering I packed on 22 miles in the last couple days, and the heat, I suppose it wasn’t that bad. I needed to sneak in this distance today, though, because I don’t know what my running will be like the next couple days. Here are today’s stats:

About 3/4 of a mile in, I had the stabbing pain in my left ankle. This time it happened as I scratched myself–it was almost as if the distraction led to the “misstep.” Other than that, I felt fine. I wasn’t all that successful in keeping my head up (yet); hopefully when the temperature cools I’ll get better.

My splits grew over the course of the run. I didn’t stop for water so maybe I was losing performance, but I wanted to do that to better train myself to work without stops. I did, though, start off with a 7:01, and I felt pretty good over that mile.

Once it rained, it cooled off, though I didn’t see it. I stopped by the set of White Collar in the pouring rain–it was shooting around the corner from where I start my runs. I saw Marsha but that was about it since they were shooting inside. No big loss: I work there tomorrow!

After the run, while typing this, I consumed a whole 32-oz. bottle of Naked Juice Protein. 64g of protein, baby! I also had refreshing coconut water just before.