Small Hill Thursday

I hate running on pavement. It's one reason I took up trail running. Asphalt assuaults. Concrete creamates. After about 4 miles on the pavement, I can almost feel my knees grinding. Running on concrete sidewalks: a prescription for disaster. An even more insidious attribute of road running: the constant noise of four big tires on pavement or the lingering odor of a car smoker. But once you hit the "zone" you no longer notice it. I hit a grove and all I think about is the next step. My breathing relaxes and I hit a smooth comfortable gait. 90 steps per minute. Regular, deep breaths. My eyes take in the sky. I hardly register the guy in the massive Suburban chatting distractedly on her cell at 20mph above the speed limit cutting dangerously close to me at the road's extreme edge...well almost.

I pounded out 7.5 miles today over the rolling hill course today. Ramp-ups and strength exercises seem to already having a positive effect. I ran to maintain about a level 6-7 effort or a high Zone 3--just slightly higher an effort than I expect to expend on my run through the Ohlone. My flat course mile time was a about 7:25 which kind of stunned me. With hills, my average came down to about 8 minute miles. Clearly, I was running faster at a lower work effort. Must remember to double up on Turkey Jerkey.

Speaking of which, I was starving all day. I ate about 6 meals and just about every thing with as much protein as possible--not consciously--responding to my body's demands. For lunch, I wolfed down a 3 serving packet of tuna fish: that gave me about 32g of protein (and about 4ml of mercury, I'm sure).

By the end of Thursday, I'm usually pretty tired. By then, I've accumulated 3 hard days of muscle stress and, of course, working hours and sleep routine, exacerbates the fatigue. Last Friday, I was dreading the day's 50+ routine. Tomorrow, Dan and I will meet and do the 50+ together and he'll introduce some pilates into my routine. We'll see how that goes.