{"id":3202,"date":"2015-06-21T16:34:27","date_gmt":"2015-06-21T21:34:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?p=3202"},"modified":"2015-06-21T16:34:27","modified_gmt":"2015-06-21T21:34:27","slug":"running-at-dark-oclock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?p=3202","title":{"rendered":"Running at Dark O’clock"},"content":{"rendered":"

The time of year has arrived. \u00a0At least in Mississippi it has arrived. \u00a0Those of us who are training for fall marathons (like me) are trying to find ways to get in the required training runs and beat the heat at the same time.<\/p>\n

This may not seem like a big deal to most of you, but trust me, it is a real concern!<\/p>\n

Last Wednesday, I began my morning 16 miler at 5:00 am. \u00a0I thought that was plenty early for 16 miles. \u00a0I had been gradually pushing my morning runs earlier and earlier into my day.<\/p>\n

See, in the winter months, I will wait until 9:00(ish) am before I run. \u00a0I am a sissy with the cold and give the day a head start so it will be (hopefully) a little bit warmer during the run. \u00a0Now, I have the opposite problem!<\/p>\n

So, Wednesday, 5:00 am rolls around and I bound out the door with a bounce in my step. \u00a0I didn’t make it a half mile before I had sweat pouring down my face and I was melting! \u00a0It was a very warm day already and I was paying for not beginning my run earlier.<\/p>\n

Seriously! \u00a05:00 am is plenty early to begin a run. \u00a0Right!?!<\/p>\n

Nope. \u00a0Not early enough.<\/p>\n

See, once that sun rises, I’m toast.<\/p>\n

We have been having the most beautiful mornings. \u00a0They sky is orange when the sun peeks above the horizon…just gorgeous! \u00a0 The beautiful sun soon turns ugly. \u00a0It turns up the heat fast and this ol’ lady can’t handle it for very long. \u00a0Facts are facts.<\/p>\n

Wednesday, I called my 16 miler at mile 13. \u00a0I was so angry with myself. \u00a0“You sissy. \u00a0You only had three measly miles to go!!!” \u00a0I knew, though, that if I would have tried for those last three miles, things would have been very, very bad.<\/p>\n

I was smart when I pulled the plug at 13. \u00a0I felt sick the rest of the day. \u00a0Had no energy. \u00a0Very unlike myself.<\/p>\n

#RespectTheWeather<\/p>\n

Thursday, I ran a quick one mile to keep that silly running streak alive. \u00a0That was one tough mile. \u00a0My feet felt like concrete blocks. \u00a0I’ve never been so glad to be one with a little one mile run in all my life!<\/p>\n

I thought all day Thursday and decided that Friday I would try for that 16 miler again. \u00a0Trying to decide when to begin the run, I set my alarm for 3:30 am<\/p>\n

My alarm went off. \u00a0I was sooooo out of it! \u00a0I just hit my phone to shut off the alarm and staggered out of bed. \u00a0Made a slice of toast and a cup of coffee when from the bedroom I heard my alarm going off again!<\/p>\n

Oops! \u00a0In my “violent” attempt to shut off the alarm, I had only put it on snooze. \u00a0Haha! \u00a0I hurried back to the bedroom to shut it off for real before it woke up MFH (My Favorite Husband).<\/p>\n

I ate my toast, drank my coffee and got my running stuff on. \u00a0Next I mixed up 40 oz of my running fuel, Inifit (Good stuff! \u00a0Google it.) sprayed on bug spray and hit the road.<\/p>\n

Backtrack just a little bit:<\/p>\n

I was very happy girl Christmas morning! \u00a0My parents had given me a set of knuckle lights! \u00a0These things are sweet! \u00a0I put my hands through the straps and used them to light my way in those early morning hours.<\/p>\n

Back to Friday morning:<\/p>\n

At 3:30 am it was 76* \u00a090% humidity. \u00a0I couldn’t believe it!!! \u00a0I was hoping for \u00a0nice, cool upper 60’s weather and hear I was still stuck with hot, muggy stuff! \u00a0The thing in my favor was no sunlight.<\/p>\n

My first 6 miles flew by, then the sun started coming up. \u00a0The higher the sun was, the slower my pace became.<\/p>\n

I had set a goal of maintaining a 12:30 pace for this run. \u00a0A year ago in these same weather conditions, my goal would have been around a 15 min pace, so this was an aggressive goal. \u00a0I am happy to report that my overall pace for the entire run was a 12:33 pace. \u00a0BOOM! \u00a0Practically on the button!!!<\/p>\n

The 16 miles took me 3 hours and 20 minutes. \u00a0A very long time. \u00a0However, considering during this past winter racing season my pace was almost a 10 min pace, this gives me hope for the next fall\/winter racing season!<\/p>\n

I see a lot of dark o’clock long runs in my immediate future. \u00a0I was dead the rest of the day Friday, but the successful run made it worth while. \u00a0I will be setting my alarm again this next week and we’ll see what we can do!<\/p>\n

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The time of year has arrived. \u00a0At least in Mississippi it has arrived. \u00a0Those of us who are training for fall marathons (like me) are trying to find ways to get in the required training runs and beat the heat at the same time. This may not seem like a big deal to most of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6,8,3,7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3202"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3202"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3202\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3204,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3202\/revisions\/3204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}