W11D6

I returned home from my long run this morning to a house full of women hell bent on spending the day scrap booking. I showered, ate a quick lunch. packed up some reading material, snacks and fluids, and headed out the door for a self imposed exile from the scissors, paper, adhesive and estrogen. I headed over to my refuge, Bonelli, found a comfortable spot to sit, read, rest the legs and soak up some sun. I found this little tidbit in the September 2009 Runner's World about the 26.2 adventure Joe and I are about the embark in in just over 3 weeks. Looks like fun, huh?

Back to the long run. In San Francisco the night before the half marathon I had a pasta dish with sauteed veggies in pasta that was tossed with olive oil and Parmesan. It sat in my stomach very well the next day. I have issues off and on with the traditional tomato sauced pastas on the long runs. Last night I tried my hand at a simple dish at home. Spaghetti with sauteed red pepper, zucchini, and summer squash with the oil and cheese. I'm happy to report that it sat quite well in my gut throughout the 22 miler. No emergency stops were required.

For the run, we had decided to do the crazy run from Yorba Linda to the beach on the Santa Ana River Trail. We'd last done this run in preparation for St. Jude. This time around we got started even earlier. I agreed to a 5:30 start, negotiated down from a proposed 5:00 a.m. start. It is still dark at 5:30 a.m., by the way. The conditions for this run couldn't have been more different from the last attempt. There was no wind this time, the temps were in the low 60's with heavy cloud cover that held throughout the run. By the time we finished the temp was just barely breaking 70. Terry, her friend Jeanne, and I ran the 22. Mike and Carol started at the other end and met us when we had just over three miles left to go with bottles of cool water.

We used the 5:15/0:45 run/walk schedule that seems to be working so well for us lately. Terry was using her watch for the run/walk timing and Jeanne was along for the run. At mile 3 I realized I'd forgotten to start my watch at the beginning. I started it then so I don't have an exact overall time. Estimating from the 19 that I timed, our overall time was somewhere around 3:40, 10:02 pace; a huge improvement over last years 4:00 run. We finished the 22 in much better shape than last time. Terry and I even raced the last few hundred feet to the finish. I won.

Today just proved the point that the conditions have a huge impact on the effort. We were blessed to have near perfect conditions today. Although a little heat, humidity and hills may have served me better for the Heart of America, I'll take it.