Monday, February 21, 2011

Running in the Dark

Sad but true story: I had to go and look at my pictures to remember what the last thing I shared with you was.

I've been documenting my life like crazy in photos but then I only post a fraction of them.  Maybe this is a good thing.  I love reading blogs with tons of pictures but I could be in the minority.  I mean really, you all probably do not enjoy seeing 10 pictures of me every post.  Honestly though, it's so much easier to blog with pictures, I don't have to use as many words!

I tried out my new watch (Garmin Forerunner 405) on Thursday for what was supposed to a be a nice easy 6 miler.  Holy heck!  Very very hard run.  I'm not sure why I struggled so much but I think it was because Florida has gotten HOT!  I've really enjoyed being able to run whenever I wanted to, it's made it really easy for me to fit in my run.  I could literally go at any time of day.  I think I'm back to early mornings and evenings again.  It is just wayyy too hot to go when the sun is shining.  I almost died of heat stroke but I made it.  I was hoping for a 10 miler but could barely even finish the 6.



Pre-run - demonstrating how large this watch is.  It is really big compared to my polar.



Holy geez it is HOT out there.  Notice Smokey's tail on the bottom right :)

After teaching a ballet class I did something I don't usually do...

I went on a run with Rachel!



We take our running after dark seriously.  I dressed like a tennis player and Rachel dressed like... well I don't know but the purpose of the neon green shirt was visibility.  I wore my fuel belt but not for fuel; I used it to attach a white light that flashes obnoxiously.  Rachel wore the red light that I usually attach to the back.



I used my new shoes for the first time

Like good runners we stretched beforehand



Okay, scratch that.  I stretched.  She played on her new phone.  Tyson stretched too ;)



We ran a good 2-3 minutes slower per mile than I am used to.  It was great!  Nice and relaxing, gorgeous temperature, great company!  I usually run alone and I thought I liked running alone but it was so much fun to have some company for a change.  You know how long distance pace is supposed to be "conversational" pace?  Well how exactly are you supposed to figure out if you're running a conversational pace when you run alone?  I am crazy... but I'm not going to talk out loud to myself while I run.  Poor Rachel, I talked to her the whole time because of course we were running a lot slower than I am used to and I had no trouble at all blabbing the whole time.  We were running her pace though which means it was not exactly easy for her to respond but I kept asking her questions that required a response anyways.  I am a meany...

I'm really enjoying the new watch.  My favorite feature is the pace feature with the auto pause when you stop being a close second.  The other watch just kept counting time when you stopped and I always had a running number going in my head of how much to subtract off of the final time - very annoying.

I'm not gonna lie though.  It's a little depressing to see my pace.  I've been thinking I was a little faster and come to find out I'm slower than I thought.  I am going to have to dive into speed workouts and hills - oh boy!  I am so excited - if you could see my excited face right now you would be totally convinced.

Hopefully I'll get a few good training runs in this week.  I'll race my virtual watch partner! ;)

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