Enduring the afternoon heat

Most days I am out the door early for my runs but on Thursday I decided to push my run to the evening. By the time that I laced up my shoes and pushed out the door the temperature was easily hovering in the upper 80s. Honestly, I was not really looking forward to these 14 miles.

May be I was just creating my own self fulfilling prophecy because I felt sluggish and slow from the very first step.  The way my legs felt; I could have been running on a sandy beach somewhere.

Perspiration began crawling down the side of my forehead before my Garmin flashed the first mile split.

I could have turned the run short and headed back, but sometimes I tend to let myself gut out a tough workout. Sometimes, I even feel better once my body gets a few miles in motion.  

Unfortunately, this was not one of those days. After nine miles my body simply felt like it had run out of energy. The gas light was on and the gauge was reading near empty.

The last five miles were tough.

After the run I took a few minutes to examine my splits. For the first nine miles, I was hitting decent splits but “gees” it didn’t feel like it. Over the last five miles I noticed something interesting. Usually running splits will vary depending on whether I am running uphill or downhill. In this run they varied more by whether I was running in the direct sunlight or in the shade. There was a much as thirty seconds difference.

Trust me, as much as an afternoon run sounds nice. Getting it down before the world heats up is a much better idea.

 

Sharing one thought at time,

The Cool Down Runner