The Little Things
October 8, 2013

On Saturday I had an 8.5 mile long run on schedule. I woke up at 7:15 to eat, and planned to be out by 8 am. Well, my plan was switched up a bit as it was pouring very hard from 7:45-10 am. I don’t mind running in the rain, but for 8.5 miles I really wanted to be able to listen to a podcast, so I held off until 10.

I don’t normally bring my hand held water bottle on long runs, but given that the humidity was 96-99% my entire run, I thought that having gatorade (sodium!) would be crucial for my POTS not completely taking over. This run (actually- it felt more like swimming since the air was so thick due to the humidity) can be broken down into “the good, the bad, and the ugly”, so here it goes:

The bad: The humidity was pretty nasty, and after the first mile and a half I realized that I was going to have to slow my pace down. I held my goal pace my entire last long run, so it was a bummer to run this one at a minute per mile slower pace than my last long run. After 4 miles I realized that seeing the pace on my garmin was upsetting and playing mind games, so I turned it to overall time and distance and that’s all I looked at. Because of POTS, I can’t push myself the way the average person can. I have to keep myself safe, and part of that is really listening to what my body needs and being sensitive to environmental factors around me.

The ugly: Miles 2-4 were the most brutal of the run, and my mental strength just crumbled. Somewhere around mile 2.9 I even convinced myself that this was the last time I was ever going to train for a half marathon. Around mile 3.5 I was feeling so physically bad at this point that I started to panic that I still had about 5 miles left to go. I suppose this wasn’t the physical wall but I hit a mental wall? Yikes.

The good: I was able to get ahold of my thoughts about mile 4, and actually had fun the rest of the run. During my last long run I had some IT band pain for the last few miles, which has become standard for my long runs. I usually foam roll afterwards (& faithfully do PT exercises), but Saturday I foam rolled before my run as well. Despite the fact that overall I felt for “blah”, my IT bands hurt far less than the have in the last few weeks. I’m not sure if it was the foam rolling or not, but I’m definitely going to try it again in the future. A breeze also picked up around mile 5, and that really helped me perk up and enjoy the rest of my run. I also tried honey stringer energy chews for the first time, and my stomach did fine with them. They were delicious and will be a nice addition to my rotation in exercise nutrition.

The run started off on a really lousy note, but around mile 4 things really started to turn around, and I actually ended up really enjoying the last 3 miles of the run. One thing I am a little concerned about is the weather I’m training in right now. I’m getting closer and closer to taper time, and all of my long runs have been in warm and humid weather. Maybe race day will be similar to that, but last year’s race was definitely cold (and in the 30s), and I’m obviously training in weather nowhere near that. It’s not the most ideal situation….

These tough runs, while frustrating, are helpful because I can see my endurance and persistence come out. In the future, on tough runs, I can recall this one to help me continue to push forward, knowing that I can make it through.

Now it’s your turn to share! What’s the “good, bad, and ugly” from a recent workout? 

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One response to “The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly in 8.5 Miles”

  1. The Little Things says:
    September 22, 2014 at 1:46 am

    […] remembered in my recap from my 8 miler from last fall’s training cycle, I wrote that I had convinced myself that I wo…. I laughed pretty hard at that, as I’ve run 3 (or 4 if you count my “unplanned” […]