New pre-run plan

Among the excitement of the weekend was a long run of 8 miles. My half is coming up next month, and I'm nearing my peak mileage - yippee!

I did not do a good job preparing for my hard exercise. I tired my legs cross-country skiing Saturday and then stuffed myself silly at Easter dinner. Then I took an afternoon nap.

While laying in my cozy bed with sunshine streaming through the window, I had my usual internal debate about whether I could postpone the run. But I didn't want to mess up my week's workout schedule, plus I'd eaten all that food with the promise that "I'll be running this afternoon":
So I dragged my lazy butt out of bed, dressed appropriately for the warm evening and set out on a new route. Brad went in a different direction to run 10 miles. I fully anticipated a horrible, slow run with a heavy tummy and side aches.

Surprisingly, I kept the pace steady, around a 9:46-minute mile. It actually felt great, and the evening sun kept disappearing behind clouds, cooling me down a bit.
I felt so good that I decided to run more a bit more. I completed my 8 miles at a 9:46 pace and then slowed to do a cool down. But I started to catch my breath and speed up. Eventually, I was running fast, and my pace was dropping quickly.

In all, I ran 9.38 miles in 1:30:55 - a 9:42 pace:
And that last 1.37 miles... a 9:18 average! So my cool down was actually a speed up :)
It felt awesome to have that kick!

So the lesson learned is to ski all day, eat a huge meal (including lots of desserts), take a short nap and then have a great run. HA!

:)