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Greetings from San Antonio, TX. It's fun to back in the US. I DO miss many things and people here, but I'm quite sure that hot and humid weather is not one them.
I ran a deaccelerating 7-miler in humid (feels like) 85F. I was supposed to run 13 miles. Did not happen. This particular ez run almost as painful as all of my workout from this Summer put together. So all of my running buddies in MD - you're tough guys! I feel so lucky that the next three days are easy (running-wise that is). Now I'm off to breakfast.
No bagel, but pretty good run. Guys (Mark, Stephen, Paul etc.) are still on the road to do their 20-miler, while I'm at home, happy and tired after a 16-miler (7.03/mile). Before the run I was able to follow the first half of men's World Champs marathon - things are not the same that they used to be. They started again hitting sub 3.00/km pace like nothing... now it's time for breakfast and some universalsports.com (I just only yesterday realized that Steve Ovett himself is their commentator).
This weather sucks. Big time. Morning shake out (6+ miles) was quite usual - not bad, nothing extraordinary. But in the evening I hated every single stride that I took on trails. Mt. Nasty took this round. Easily. Yesterday I felt quite good, but today.... today was really much about balancing those feelings (back to normal?). WC's 1500m was an insane race, really typical championship race one could say.
On Thursday evening we decided that it's finally time to go to the beach. So on Friday we found ourselves in a long, slowly moving line of cars heading to the resorts in Delaware. Conveniently we chose to drive to Dewey Beach since there was an opportunity to race on Saturday morning. This sounded so great beforehand. However, during the actual race (which turned out to be a tempo run with declining pace) in a humid and pretty warm weather I regretted the whole decision to even take my racing flats with me. I crashed totally already after 2k which wasn't so uplifting. Fortunately, the rest of the day compensated that feeling quite effectively.
Chicago is warm and humid. I've heard stories about this and now I know that they are true. Tomorrow morning I'm most likely running that 5k race, if I find where it is, and if this weather is not getting crazier. Luckily, I was able to run around 9 miles in the morning under way better conditions. Now I'm watching the lights of Trump Tower across the river. I normally dislike heights, but I find 19th floor as an entertaining alternative for the normal 4th floor. Oh, and this evening's Entrepreneurship Social meeting was fun and nutritive.
In the morning I ran an easy jog with sweetie. I included some short steep hill sprints which felt pretty heavy. It meant that afternoon's trail run was going to be heavy as well. And it was. Even if we decided to run the normal loop backwards, I still got my ass kicked. Weather was again enough humid. After all, it was a good day.
This morning was brutal for runners. Even if this trend of "bad" weather has been going on for couple of weeks already, today was something else. Accordingly, I got beaten by the humidity and slow legs. And all of this happened during a 5 mile tempo run (5.49/mile). I can't even imagine what would happen during a 10-miler... But today's run is done and that is the best. In addition, universialsports.com will ease the pain with a live coverage from Stockholm, Sweden today.
What is wrong with this weather? When you open the door it's like entering a mouth of a cow. Well, I haven't yet been inside one, but I let myself assume that the general feeling would rather similar. After a morning jog of 4+ miles in the middle of this standstill weather I recalled a valuable lesson: NEVER enter a sauna, if it is not yet ready for having a sauna. Under other than optimal conditions (194-212F) the feeling would be quite close to sitting inside cow's mouth. And that is not refreshing at all. Trust me on this one. In the evening I'm heading to trails with guys. Mt. Nasty is waiting... And she is still waiting. We chose to run the CCBC loop. After we came back to the finish (I had a hard run due to gastrointestinal problems) one of us was missing. So I had an opportunity to run a little more. Luckily, he was found before the darkness arrived. Before my stomach started to punish me on behalf of Mt. Nasty I felt pretty good. Today's mileage: 18.
Damn, I hate humidity. Despite of disliking it, it provides me an excellent excuse for slow and laborious tempo run which I just finished. HR was way higher than earlier, while the pace was almost 10 seconds slower per km. Not even one stride that I took was easy today. Of course I should blame myself more than external factors. Early morning, low level of fluids, not enough energy... should these be taken into account before I start to accuse circumstances for not-so-good flow. Or am I already on a downward spiral even if I haven't yet really started to train?In the evening I sneaked out for a 10-miler on trails. Ran slower than ever. Just because...In addition to the day of Independence, weekend brings some interesting events. On Friday the legendary Bislett Games will take place in Oslo, Norway. Then on Sunday my buddy Mika is doing an Ironman in Austria.
Tuesday morning 6.15 AM, 65F with 90% humidity. Black track under racing flats, pace 5.10-5.15 per mile, 6 repeats followed by 4x200m. This is it. A joy, just a minor pain, but in all a feeling that is known only among runners. This one goes out to Moguli in Finland!BUT 1.5 hours later after this nice moment I found that Janne Holmén (European Champion in marathon, a 2.10 runner, double olympian etc.) has decided to end his successful career as a competitive runner. It's a clear loss for Finnish distance running, but on the other hand a respectful decision. Thank you Janne!
Warm and humid Bagel run didn't include any bagels nor drinks other than water. We ran a nice 13.1 miler with Stephen, Carlos and Tim. All together today's run was 14.5 miles. Back at home I enjoyed enormous amount of cold Pepsi Max.
With 92% relative humidity and temperature of 70s already in the morning one should not expect wonders. So I didn't. I just ran 8k tempo (29.15) with ~4 mile warm up/cool down. I took HRM with me in order to keep the effort at the moderate level, since I'm still acclimatizating.
Considering all the excuses mentioned above, I felt fine today.
This morning our jog felt like running through water. Sweetie almost tripped on a turtle which has crawling on the road. Humidity is now 91%, and with 70s temperature the weather is ... different. But this is way better than icy roads.
Morning jog and today's only run was an easy ~9 miles (6.58/mile). There was rain, thunder, lightning, 78F, and me. This evening is dedicated to music: NINJA 2009 takes a turn at Merriweather!
