Woke up at 5:30 and got my gear ready (snot gel...I did 2 flasks today...one with 3 packs of the gel mixed with water and the other with 3 packs of gel with caffeine for the last half of the walk/run). I rigged out the gel flask carriers with Velcro strips instead of clips...one came close to falling off a time or 2 so I didn't want to take any chances. I prepared the electrolyte water flasks, recovery drink, protein drink and put them in a cooler, Cliff bar bites, Kleenex, tp, drivers license, cell phone...I think that's it. Anyway, it was supposed to rain today according to the weather forecast so I wore my old shoes so I wouldn't get my new ones muddy (this turned out to be a mistake because it didn't rain and my feet did not like those old shoes with their totally worn out insoles!). It was still dark when I met Rachel at Walton on the Mopac trail. We met there because there's a porta john (ick!) there and it gave more options for the long run today. It was still dark and when I got out of the car I was greeted by a hooting owl near the grain elevator. This picture of the grain elevator at Walton was taken later in the day:
It was really nice of Rachel to even be there because she had tickets to the Nebraska football game today (her first time going to a game!) and so she said she would walk the first 14 miles with me and then I was on my own. I told her she could leave after the first 8 miles because I was doing fine, but she insisted on staying with me...she's so nice! I couldn't ask for a better coach! It was cloudy pretty much the whole day and we saw 2 opossums crossing the road at different times early on in the run.
From Walton (at about the 3 mile marker) we went east for 4 miles then turned back and came back to mile 3 then went west to the start of the trail and back to Walton. At that point Rachel had to leave so I went back to mile 0 at the start of the trail again and then back to Walton to my car. WOO HOO...I DID IT!!! 20 MILES!!!! I'm not going to say it was easy, but I did it! The first 10 miles I kept a pretty good pace ...about 15.4 min/mile but by the time I got done - a total of 5 hours and 15 minutes...non-stop except for one bathroom break and 2 water fills...my final pace was 15.8 min/mile...a great improvement over my recent long runs...so I was very satisfied with this. I kept my pace of 2 minutes walk and 30 seconds run the whole time...even though I ran out of steam a bit the last 5 or 6 miles (it was the running that was hard!).
The walk was pretty as usual on the Mopac. There were the usual signs of bikes crossing the path and horse crossing signs...
…. and I did see horses crossing the trail today.
But my favorite sight of the day on the Mopac was this sign:
Nebraska…you gotta love it!
Drank my recovery drink and protein drink in the car before heading home. Did the drill at home…ice bath, lunch, and I added ibuprofen today…I wanted to take all the preventative measures I could today. Later on in the afternoon I drove Leo out to the trail and we hiked in about ½ mile so I could show him the tractor sign!
Took it easy the rest of the day except for a trip to the grocery store. My hips and legs were sure stiff this afternoon…especially after sitting down for any length of time. I was ok once I started moving again…but ooooh…that initial several steps after sitting…ouch!!
So total miles walked/run this week= 34 !! Total miles for my entire training period =
371 miles!!!!!!! Wowza dowza!!
Go-go granny go!
ReplyDeleteYou amaze me every time I read your blog.
Keep it up, the goal is in sight. ~val