The ugly truth

I've been mostly silent about yesterday's Holiday Half Marathon in Point Clear, Alabama because my run, quite frankly, was awful.

I'm still exhausted. Sore. Exhausted. (Did I mention exhausted?) And I don't really want to talk about it. But we can't shit roses and rainbows all the time, so here's the ugly truth...

Smiling near the finish line BEFORE the race...

On Friday I mentioned that I was setting the bar low goal-wise for this race. In fact, I planned to treat it more like a well-supported training run than a race.

For my sanity's sake, I'm glad I did. I could not have raced yesterday if I tried.

I signed up for the Holiday Half a few weeks ago, thinking (Yeah. What was I thinking??) that earlier this year I could run a half marathon with a week's notice, so Why should this be any different?

Why, indeed.

Clearly I was delusional.

Delusion #1: I'm healed from my injury, and that means full speed ahead!

Reality: Aside from pool running, I did almost no running in August and September. I couldn't. My calf and foot needed time off. Unfortunately, time off equals lost endurance.

While biking is an endurance sport, endurance is not like riding a bike. You don't just get back in the game and "remember" how to run for two hours. It doesn't work that way. The handful of easy-paced 9 to 11 milers I finished in November were not enough to make up for months of low mileage.

Yes, I am smart enough to know this. (See low bar for race goals, above.) I am also smart enough to know that I can run a half marathon with 10-mile training runs. This delusion alone would not have sunk my battleship.

Delusion #2: I can handle running in the heat. I do it all the time!

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Reality: Race-day humidity at 90 percent, morning temperatures in the 70s, and bright sunshine on a mostly shade-less course are my triple Kryptonite.

And yes, I'm a Florida runner who should be used to this.

BUT (and this is where reality bites) I'm used to this in July.

The past few weeks have seen temperatures in the 40s, and my long run days were all cool and dry. The weather warmed up only days before the race, leaving me with about as little acclimation as a snowbird fresh off the plane from Minnesota.

TMI (unless you're a runner): During the race I sweat so much I could have wrung seawater out of my clothes. I drank two full 20-ounce bottles of water while on the course, chugged two cups of gatorade at the finish, and still didn't have to pee for an hour after the race.

The result:
I didn't run my slowest half ever, but my pace on the pancake-flat course was about on par with what I usually run for hilly half marathons (think Torrey Pines hill at the La Jolla Half Marathon in San Diego). S-l-o-w.

And I'm sore.

And even though I said I wasn't going to race, I'm still bummed that I didn't have a good run yesterday.

What's your worst race ever?
What's your favorite self-delusion?
How do you deal with a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad run?

Odd advice for beating the heat

Last summer was my first Florida summer. I've lived in hot places before (Hello, Phoenix!), though I'd prefer to forget about that bad-and-short-lived decision...

I won't give up running.
The Florida Panhandle won't give up being hot and humid.
So summer running and I have had to come to an understanding.

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Here are some of the tricks I use to help beat the heat:

• Carry a frozen water bottle. The bottle gets bathwater warm by mile 3, but at least I have cold water for the first 20 minutes or so.
• Wear a headband to keep the sweat out of my eyes.
• Chew mint gum. Sounds crazy (be careful not to inhale the gum!) but it does have a psychological cooling effect.
• Run very early in the morning.
• Move to the treadmill when temperatures rise into the mid-90s.
• Take walk breaks. Yes, folks - I'll take a walk break from time to time on the hottest days. You can call me a wuss if you want, but I know my limits. That's not wussy. It's wisdom.

I thought my list was pretty solid, but every once in awhile someone gives a little advice that seems counterintuitive.

Miss Zippy provides some guidance on acclimating to the heat (which I, admittedly, do - but I don't often write into my list of "beat the heat" strategies.

To date, the award for "strangest advice anyone has ever given me" goes to the gentleman I met at Jazzfest who told me he "loves running in the heat and loves the sweat." His trick is to cut up a lemon, and put a wedge in his mouth before he heads out the door for a run. That keeps him feeling refreshed during his sweltering summer runs.

When life gives you lemons... suck on them while you're running!

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Skeptical?

So am I, but I might try it anyway. Who knows? I thought chewing gum while running sounded dumb, too. Until I tried it.

What tricks do you use to beat the summer heat?
What's the weirdest advice you've ever gotten from a stranger?

Vacation brain

The Green Bay marathon issue stirred up a pet peeve of mine (see yesterday's post). This pet peeve is an affliction I refer to as "vacation brain."

Vacation brain is the common ailment that strikes vacationers and recreation-ers alike, causing them to throw caution to the wind due to an overwhelming sense that "nothing bad happens on vacation."

• I've seen tourists walk into oncoming traffic. (What makes you think a Manhattan cab is going to stop just because you want to cross the street?)
• I've watched families in Yellowstone get out of the car and approach a grizzly bear for a photo op. (Really people? Those things bite!)
• I once saw a hiker crouch down with his 3-year-old toddler to point out a mountain lion 20 yards away. (Again with the biting! A toddler looks like lunch to that cat.)
• I passed a lady 2 miles down into the Grand Canyon. She was wearing high heels. (Hello honey, don't you realize you have to walk back UP? And didn't you see the signs at the top about proper gear and precautions?)
• I personally took a water taxi to a remote beach in Cabo to snorkel. Alone. (Yes, folks. That might be the dumbest thing I've ever done.)
• We've all heard the Aron Ralson story...and...
• I've seen otherwise sensible runners push themselves to the point of injury just because an event is called a "race."

In short, "vacation brain" makes us poor judges of risk.

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If a bear sauntered into a family's back yard, they'd lock the doors and call animal control. But on vacation, risk assessment gets all screwed up somehow. Not only does the family not lock the doors, they reach out to pet the grizzly!

Then, if something does go wrong, emergency personnel and good samaritans will drop everything to help out, which might put even more people in danger.

Getting back to the marathon issue, everything I've heard from runners at Green Bay suggests that the course was well supported. Water stations were ample. (The event organizer added extra water stops when they learned of the warm weather forecast.) In addition, there were cooling/spraying stations along the route. This was not a situation in which the event coordinators were unprepared. In fact, by all accounts, volunteers stayed on the course to support runners even after the event was closed down.

Green Bay organizers did the race equivalent of shooing the bears away, and when that didn't work, they shut the race down.

Sometimes race organizers do deserve blame for poor planning, but this doesn't seem to be one of those cases.

So why, then, did dozens of runners seek medical attention?

I suspect it's a combination of factors.

Running in the heat is hard. Duh.
(Those of us who live in the south speak from experience.)
Some people have more trouble in the heat than others. Some people will get injured during a large half marathon no matter how good the planning is - it's a law of large numbers issue.

Running in the heat requires acclimation.
(Wisconsin in May is not Florida in May... That does make a difference, even if I would prefer to think we're just tougher down here.)

But no matter what the location or time of year: running in the heat doesn't need to turn into a total circus. That brings me back to... Vacation Brain.

Some of the responsibility for race safety should be pointed back at us - the participants.

Call it vacation-brain, call it race-day ego, call it poor risk assessment. No matter what the name is, it is our instinct to react differently during a "race" than we would in our own backyard. We're supposed to "tough it out" because it's a race. Or we expect that things will be fine because we're in the "safe" environment of an organized event.

Unfortunately, not stopping when we feel overheated is the running equivalent of that photo op with the grizzly (or my solo snorkeling expedition in Cabo).

Each and every day we need to assess risks as they are before us, not as they wish they would be.

Treating heat illness
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Even thought I know most readers already know the basics, I'm going to repeat something I posted a couple of weeks ago (from Medlineplus.gov):

• Heatstroke - a life-threatening illness in which body temperature may rise above 106° F in minutes; symptoms include dry skin, rapid, strong pulse and dizziness
• Heat exhaustion - an illness that can precede heatstroke; symptoms include heavy sweating, rapid breathing and a fast, weak pulse
• Heat cramps - muscle pains or spasms that happen during heavy exercise
• Heat rash - skin irritation from excessive sweating

So, running friends, as we roll into the summer months, please stay cool out there!
Be safe!
(And avoid the bears.)

What's the silliest thing you've ever done or seen someone do on vacation?

Blame game

You may have heard that the Cellcom Green Bay Marathon closed down their race after only 2:35. The reason? High temperatures sent about 20 people to the emergency room and dozens more were evaluated on-site for heat illness.

People are questioning whether or not the race should have been suspended.
People are questioning whether or not the race should have even started.

I will not knock a race director for making a judgement on the side of safety.

That said - I think there's a larger issue at play here:

Did runners start losing their sense of personal responsibility?

Isn't it every runner's duty to know the signs of heat illness and react accordingly (i.e. before it becomes a medical crisis)?

I know that there are negligent organizers in the world, and I would not want to race with one of them. And cancelling a race for a hurricane, blizzard, tornado, or heat wave is perfectly logical.

But the blame game lately seems to be shifting the balance - especially for warmer than "expected" weather - away from runners and onto the shoulders of race organizers. In reality, a race director will never know if my personal "too hot" is 70 degrees or 85. It should be my responsibility to know my limits and plan/react accordingly. If I feel taxed by the weather, it should be me who is smart enough to slow down, walk, dunk my head in an ice bucket, or DNF.

Yes, even DNF is an option. The shot fired from a starting gun is merely a signal. No one points it at a runner's head and says "You will finish!"

So, in general, my mental math looks something like this:

• A race that runs out of water = organizer's fault
• A runner who pushes too hard and gets hurt = runner's fault

In reality, situations are rarely so clear-cut, but I worry that if this blame-game trend continues, we'll soon be left only with December races in Seattle. (Oh, but then there would be rain...)

What's your take on calling off or cancelling races on account of the weather?

Heat warnings, DNS, and DNF

By now, you've probably heard that the Boston Athletic Association is encouraging runners to take things easy, walk, or sit tomorrow's race out due to predicted record temperatures. (For more info see Miss Zippy and Will Run for Beer.)

I am a strong believer that runners train to race through tough conditions. After all, as one of my favorite race-day posters reads "If it was easy, everyone would do it."

BUT

Each race has its own unique circumstances and conditions. Expecting a PR when running into 20mph headwinds is just silly. Expecting that the heat won't affect your race is borderline dangerous, even if you have been training in the heat.

Treating heat illness
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Our sport glorifies those who push through tough circumstances. After all, if we don't push ourselves beyond our comfort zones, we'll never improve. But there is a fine line between exceptional performance and stupid risk-taking. So...

...in the spirit of full disclosure, I have DNFed, and it's OK.

After training for a year for a triathlon in Encinitas, CA, including many hours of swim workouts, I thought I was ready for anything. Unfortunately on race morning the surf was 8-10 feet with a strong rip current.

I watched the first wave (elites) get dragged 400 yards off course. Still, I got into the water.

I got pummeled and dragged off course by the current. I was not making headway against the surf.

I turned and paddled back in to shore. I had an official cut off my timing chip. I finished the bike and run as a fun run. I won't say I'm proud of my DNF, but I am proud that I was wise enough to know my limits that day.

I also have one race that I DNSed.

Another triathlon was scheduled in the autumn. San Diego had gone more than 180 days without rain. On the day before the race, the heavens opened up, washing 6 months of trash, dog poo, and other unmentionables into the bay.

While the County had officially closed all waters to swimming, the race organizers chose not to turn the race into a duathlon. The swim was on, despite all health regulations to the contrary.

I was not getting in that water.

I slept in.

Reading reports of sinus infections, sore throats, and other post-race ailments, I've never regretted the decision to not start that race.

And heat is my enemy in any race.

Northwest Florida is warm all the time.

When I run, it's hot outside.

My body, theoretically, is used to this.

Still, in this morning's half marathon, I suffered from heat illness. While I have no formal diagnosis, I can say that at about mile 11 I noticed I had stopped sweating (despite consuming two full bottles of water).

I threw in the towel and walked.

This wasn't a wussy move on my part. I knew the symptoms and made a calculated decision. And, it turns out, my on-the-fly diagnosis was pretty accurate. I took my temperature an hour after the race - 100 degrees - and that was after soaking in a cold bath.

So, the moral of this story is: if you are running in the heat, keep these symptoms in mind (from Medlineplus.gov):

• Heatstroke - a life-threatening illness in which body temperature may rise above 106° F in minutes; symptoms include dry skin, rapid, strong pulse and dizziness
• Heat exhaustion - an illness that can precede heatstroke; symptoms include heavy sweating, rapid breathing and a fast, weak pulse
• Heat cramps - muscle pains or spasms that happen during heavy exercise
• Heat rash - skin irritation from excessive sweating

Walking might be an ego-bruiser, but being carted off the course in an ambulance is way worse.

Be safe, friends!

Have you ever DNSed or DNFed a race?

Post run sweatpocalypse

You might call it Sweatmageddon.
Sweatpocalypse.
A Sweat Tsunami.

Summer has arrived on the Gulf Coast and my evening 12-miler was a sweaty affair to say the least. Thankfully Hubby was around to document the damage.

Post run: The cold floor tiles feel sooooo good!
Just ignore the puddle of sweat...

Don't judge.

After 2 slow, slogging hours in the sun, I wanted nothing more than to cool off and put my feet up. The floor tiles just happened to be the coldest thing in the house. If I could have taken a nap in the refrigerator, I probably would have.

What I didn't count on was condensation. 2 minutes after laying down, I realized I was making a sweat puddle.

Sexy, I know.

But I'm proud of it.

Today tried really hard to be a no good, very bad day. (I did my fair share of cussing, whining, and complaining, to be sure.)

This morning's thunder and lightning tried to sideline me. My mid-day was steamrolled by project deadlines at work (yes, working on Saturday. Ugh.) and California non-resident tax forms. (Hello California, could you make the forms any more confusing?)

When I went out the door this evening, I was already in a pissy mood. The temperature could have turned me around for home. The heat was just another straw on the bad-day camel's back.

But, knowing I needed a little extra motivation, I packed my mp3 player (rare event unless I'm on a treadmill). I played some of my favorite running songs and just kept putting one foot in front of the other for 120 minutes.

I admit that I wussed out a little and turned down streets for their shadiness or lack-of-hills, rather than tackling a tougher route. I won't claim this was my "best run ever." In fact, there were times when it was downright ugly. (Photo above is an excellent case-in-point...)

I did, truth be told, stop back at home at the 100-minute mark, grab a glass of ice water (my water bottle was bone dry) and ask/beg Hubby to come trot with me for the last 20 minutes.

He obliged.

And then took the photo.

..but it will be harder for him to use it as blackmail now that I've posted it on the interwebs. Heh.

What's your strategy for coping with a bad day?

Race Report: Gulf Shores Half Marathon

The start: Low key starting area with maybe not enough port-o-potties. The Gulf Coast Half Marathon at Gulf Shores was definitely a small race (fewer than 500 runners) but what they lacked in pre-race frills, the organizers more than made up for in post-race awesomeness.

The bad: I'm having a hard time thinking of anything negative. So I'm going to stop trying. (Quitter, I know. But this is good quitting.)

This is the best half marathon I've run. Ever. And I don't throw around terms like "best" lightly, at least not with races.

My only complaint today: the weather sucked, but that's not the race's fault. With fog as thick as pea soup, this was a warm and wet 13.1. As one runner told me while we were waiting in the port-o-potty line, it was "not a PR kind of day." But that's ok... because it was an awesome-race kind of day!

When I said "thick fog" I meant it...
Note that you can't read street signs.

The good: Where do I begin...
Spectators were few and far between, but water stations were frequent (one at almost every mile) and the water station volunteers were wonderful. Seriously, a girl could get spoiled with this kind of course support. The Gulf Shores half might have ruined me for other races...

LA Parrotheads water station.
They even had a live parrot!

Water station mascot.

The course was gorgeous. Even in the thick fog, or maybe because of it, the run covered some beautiful scenery -- coastal dunes, salt marshes, pine forests. I want to go back to this part of Alabama when I have time to stop and enjoy the view.

9 runners who look just like me!
(Hubby found a new feature on his camera. I am a fan!)

The finish: Holy after-party, Batman! (Or should I say "Lulu?")
Jimmy Buffett's sister, Lucy, runs Lulu's Homeport in Gulf Shores, Alabama, and man does she know how to throw a party!

The entire indoor/outdoor restaurant was open to runners, which meant plenty of seating and plenty of food. Runners and guests had access to unlimited jambalaya, red beans and rice, fresh fruit, cookies, beer, and sports drinks. And even more important, race-walkers had plenty of hot food still available when they finished (all too often the food is gone by the time walkers wrap up).

A live band played tunes for a couple of hours. If the guests weren't doing the "post-race shuffle" it would have felt like just another vacation day at a beach resort.

My race: If you've been reading awhile, you know I don't run well on hot-and-humid days. But I still shaved 4 minutes off of my last half marathon time. I'm convinced that on a cooler day I'll be able to break 2 hours.

The weather put a damper on my A-game goals, but I solidly accomplished negative splits. I ran smart in the first half, and strong in the second. Unofficial results have me at 40 out of 215 female runners, and I had a smile on my face (almost) the whole time.

I can't wait to go back next year and move up the ranks!
(Hell, I'd go back and run this race again next weekend if they'd let me. It was that good.)

What's the best post-race party you've ever been to?

Perfect conditions

Tomorrow I had hoped for temperatures in the 40s. Dry weather might have been nice, too.

Instead, no matter how many times I check weather.com, the forecast remains: mid-60s, 94 percent humidity (yes, folks -- 94 percent humidity -- 6 points shy of a swimming pool), and thunderstorms.

Ideal race conditions these are not.

I started to second-guess my race: Maybe I should have run last weekend when the weather was perfect for a half marathon! Why did I spectate when I could have been running?

Source: fierce-fit-fabulous.tumblr.comvia Beth on Pinterest

Maybe I should sleep in...?

Yeah, right!

Tomorrow's race isn't just about seeing how fast I can go after a couple more months of training. It is the first 13.1 in my goal of 5 goal half marathons this year.

It is also another notch on my "race in a different state" belt.

And I knew I wasn't going to "win" the race anyway. That's not why I run.

So I'm going out there tomorrow. I may be fast (gotta' outrun those lightning bolts!). Or I may be slow (this is running, not swimming, right?)

But no matter what, when I come home tomorrow, I'll have covered 13.1 beautiful new miles.

Good. Bad. Weird. Wonderful.

Good: Finished 2 runs today.
My legs are slowly starting to feel less like lead and more like legs!

Bad: I'm home alone in Florida and my San Diego friends are at a holiday party. Without me.
Florida FAIL.

Weird: I bumped into a former student at a group run tonight. Met his mom, too. Good for them for exercising! But weird to meet a student when I'm wearing schlubby old running clothes and my hair is a hot mess. (See "Bad" below.)

Good: Discovered a free yoga class in my neighborhood. Score!

Bad: The humidity is so intense, my house keys collect condensation as soon as I step outside. (Just imagine what's that's doing to my hair. Even ponytails can't survive sauna conditions. Not ideal running weather, either...) Florida fail again!

Weird: On my morning run, there was a pig rooting around in a neighbor's lawn.
Yes.
A pig.
I do not live in, on, or anywhere near a farm.
I still have no idea where the pig came from or where he was going.
The weirdest part: I stopped to stare. Another runner passed and didn't notice at all. (Seriously, dude. How do you not notice a 150 pound PIG on the side of the road??? If a third neighbor hadn't also noticed the little porker, I'd have worried for my sanity.)

Wonderful: Just as I was starting to be really bummed out about sitting at home alone (Hubby's away for work tonight), missing my California friends, this song came on World Cafe:


If I have to be stuck home alone, finding good new music is a consolation prize I'm willing to accept.

What song(s) are on "repeat" on your playlist right now?
Any other good/bad/weird/wonderful events today?

Sleeping in and smelly internet

Let me just start out by saying that I didn't sleep very well last night. When my alarm clock went off at 6am, I dutifully reset ignored it, thinking that I'd wake up at 7.

I'm sure you can see where this is going...
Yep.
I accidentally slept in until 9am.
Doh!
I had such big plans for the morning! Having used up 3 hours with sleep, rather than errands, clearly none of my pre-work chores were going to get done. But I planned a 4-mile run. My dilemma: Could I pull on my gym clothes, get out the door, run, shower, change, grab coffee/breakfast, and log in at work by 10?

The answer, of course, was (mostly) yes.

My second unintended surprise of the morning was walking out the front door. I felt like I got slapped in the face with a warm, wet dishtowel. But there was no dishtowel. It's just Florida in November. (C'mon Florida. It's Thanksgiving for crying out loud! Can we cool it with the summer weather already? Unlike Jamoosh, I do not love humidity.)

I did a sweaty 3.5 mile loop through the neighborhood, and at several points I had to ask myself: "Am I running this morning, or swimming?" I wish I were kidding. Last night the local news weatherman described the weather as "soupy."
Don't be jealous.
Really.
Don't.
I'll trade 80 degrees and 97 percent humidity for snow ANY DAY.

So 3.5 miles < 4.0 miles, but I was cutting it close to begin with. I ran into the house, brewed a pot of coffee, and dove into my desk chair at 9:55 still wearing my soaked gym clothes.

Thank goodness my coworkers haven't installed Olly, the smell-your-internet robot for our web conferences. They'd fire me, for sure!

Ok - in reality, Olly doesn't work by transferring scents over the interwebs... It's much less sophisticated, but also much less panic-inducing. The end user loads a specific scent to pair with a specific event. So my coworkers could make my emails smell like sunshine and roses! They'd never know I didn't have time for a shower until my lunch break! (Unless they read this... Doh!)

How often do you oversleep?
What do you think of the scented internet phenomenon?

Stockholm Syndrome

It's official. I've lived on the Gulf Coast for too long. A few of days of rain dropped the temperatures down to a reasonable 81 degrees, and 78 percent humidity.

Yes, I said "reasonable" in the same sentence as 81 degrees and 78 percent humidity.

Break out the white jacket and restraints. Clearly I've lost my mind. The first sign of Swampholm-Stockholm Syndrome is thinking 81 and humid is "reasonable" weather.

Nevertheless, crazy or not, I used the lovely "break from the heat" as an excuse to squeeze a run into my work schedule yesterday. I couldn't risk waiting until after work to lace up my running shoes, because the evening forecast predicted severe thunderstorms - and even crazy people have their limits.

So I took a late afternoon "smoke break" and went out for a 30 minute run. (Hey, if the smokers can take 15 minutes off two or three times a day, I see no reason why I can't run in between meetings. Smoking or running, we come back to the office smelling gross. But at least running doesn't increase group insurance premiums!)

After the run, I plopped right back down in my office chair (which I covered with a towel, for the chair's protection -- I was still soaked through with sweat) to work late and wrap up a project that's due.

So, the moral of this story is: I'm not sure what the most shocking symptom of craziness is:

1. being psyched about sneaking in a sweaty run,
   
2. covering my chair with a towel so I can get back to work post-haste, or
   
3. admitting to the blogosphere that I did 1, and 2 above.
   

What's the craziest thing you've ever done to make sure you get to run?

Running with my husband - good for my pace, bad for my ego

This morning I went out for a 4 mile run with my husband. Just before the 2-mile mark, I commented "wow, we've got some speed this morning" as it was the fastest not-on-a-treadmill run I've done in weeks. As I've mentioned before, the heat and humidity are killing my outdoor run pace (and my hair...) but I am keeping up with speedwork at the gym.

I felt like I was pushing myself, and was enjoying my 8:45ish pace.

My husband's response was "I'm just warming up." About 200 yards later he sped off.

So much for feeling speedy.

I used to get frustrated by my hubby's tendency to leave me in the dust. A couple of years ago, in our early dating days, there was one run which we agreed to "run together." A mile into the run, he took off. 30 minutes later I tripped on a tree root sticking out of the trail and tumbled ass over teakettle. When I finally caught up with him at our breakfast place, I was covered in gravel and had a twig stuck in my hair. Furious doesn't begin to describe my state of mind that day... mad because he took off, mad because I couldn't keep up, mad because I was scraped and filthy, and my pride was bruised to boot.

But when I did finally catch up with him, he was waiting patiently for me and was holding a cold glass of water because he knew I'd need one. He took me home and cooked me breakfast while I showered, because I couldn't sit in the restaurant covered in dirt.

Over the years I've learned to accept that he's way faster than me, and probably way faster than I'll ever be. But trying to keep up has made me a better runner. Knowing that he's watching the clock between when he wraps up a run and I when I do means that my ego won't let me take walk breaks. My race times improved, literally, by 2 minutes per mile (even more for the half-marathon) since we started running together.

And he's always waiting for me at the finish line with a cold glass of water...

Just a little trick

This morning, on a particularly hot and sticky run, I reverted to an old psychological trick that I haven't had to play on myself in years. It's the "just keep running until you get to ________, and then you can rest" trick.
(Insert "that tree" "the white mailbox" "the next street light" and you get the idea.)

You pick some inanimate object, say 50 yards away, and promise yourself that you just need to run to that object, and then you can take a rest. When you're, say, 20 feet away from the target, you convince yourself that you can run "just a little farther" to the next target - another 50 yards away. Left foot. Right foot. Repeat.

When I first started huffing and puffing my way to being a runner (we won't talk about how many years ago that was) I used this little trick regularly to stretch my runs from 1/4 mile to 1/2 mile... then to 2 miles... and eventually to my first 5k. By that point, I was hooked and no longer needed tricks to keep myself motivated. (Well, that is, until I met the sauna that is northwest Florida. Hello humidity!)

How my legs haven't caught on to what my brain is doing, I'll never know, but it does work. I "tricked" my feet into carrying me through the second half of a 90+ degree run this morning. By the end I was so drenched in sweat that I looked like I had gotten caught in a rain storm, but I finished.

And man did that cold shower afterward feel good!

Learning to love the dreadmill

One of the things I love most about running is the time it gives me to go outside and play. I love the scenery. The fresh air. Watching surfers bobbing in the waves, waiting for their ride. Spying on dog-walkers, and wondering who is walking whom? Getting a regular tour of the neighborhood to see what new construction is underway or which neighbor is having a yard sale.

But with my perfect-year-round 68-degree San Diego days now 2,000 miles away, and a Florida Panhandle 90-degree, 95-percent-humidity summer stretching out in front of me, I am in a bit of a bind. I either have to accept a pace so slow I might as well be walking (which sort of destroys all of the progress I've made in training over the past thee years), or I have to make peace with the piece of equipment runners love to hate: the dreaded treadmill.

So I've sucked up my running pride, cast away all "dreadmill" stereotypes, and have learned to embrace my new running friend. In the mornings Kiran Chetry has become my running buddy, filling me in on all of the day's breaking news. Instead of surfers, I get to watch dancers, in the odd instances when Vh1 stops the chatter and actually plays a music video. I won't claim that the treadmill will ever replace the freedom of outdoor running, but I am learning to enjoy it, especially for interval training.

My new favorite treadmill workout:
10 minute warmup (starting at a 10 minute mile pace and gradually increasing to 9)
6 x 90 second sprints (1 min. at btwn 7:00-7:30 pace, last 30 seconds @ 6:30-6:50 pace) with 1 minute recovery (9:30 pace)
10 minute recovery and cool-down


By keeping the speed up on my treadmill workouts, I'm hoping to avoid any "damage" being done to my overall pace on my slogging, sluggish outdoor runs in the heat.


Photo courtesy of http://metaphoricalplatypus.com/
Photo link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/29638108@N06/5618665304/