The triumphant return that fizzled

This morning I did two things I haven't done for a while: run on the NCR Trail and run with my Garmin strapped to my wrist. The results were mixed. I start training for my next half marathon this week and my first long run next Sunday is supposed to be 1:30:00 long, so I figured I'd run 1:15:00 today. And that's what I did. Barely. For the first half I was zipping right along like it wasn't 80 freakin' degrees outside at 6:30am.


The trail that welcomed me back to the Trail this morning.
So, needless to say (or it should be), the last half was rough. I thought about stopping at 45 minutes, 50 minutes, 55 minutes, 60 minutes, 65 minutes and 70 minutes. But I cajoled myself a little further when those times rolled around. Convincing myself to just make it to next mile marker, and when I got to next mile marker telling myself to just get to the next 5 minute time increment. There was also avoiding the shame of possibly being passed by all the people I passed on the way out -- a not insignificant number -- that kept me going. It worked, but my pace over the last half of the run was ungreat. The first went by at about an 8:05/mile pace, but the last half sauntered by at about an 8:50/mile pace. That's not too too terrible in the grand scheme of things, I guess, but if I was running a half marathon I would have been toast. It would have been a catastrophe of Frederickian proportions.

But it's over, I completed the run and now I can hide out from the heat all day. Yay!