Chasing my Dreams

Ran the shoreline trail onto the highline trail with Tom this morning. We weren't flying, but it took two miles before my legs really had any energy. I could have killed Tom on the uphills, so I took them pretty easy. My legs still didn't have tons of pop. I did 4 more miles up Green Canyon, which honestly I think did my legs wonders. The gradual uphill worked the legs, and then I was able to relax on the downhill coming back. No real pains or aches today. 7:30s average. I didn't get the best night's sleep last night, as I kept waking up in the middle of the night. I also didn't eat lunch yesterday and wasn't as hydrated yesterday as I should have been.

I still didn't have the most restful of nights last night, which was a little frustrating in all honesty. I don't know why I can't sleep without waking up. I told myself I was going to make today a fairly easy fartlek. I wanted to push the bigger uphills though (partially to get after the strava segments). I ran by feel, which ended up being slower than I would have anticipated. I only noticed it on my fast parts, but I didn't feel like I was getting in my complete stride. It felt like my hips were stopping my legs from fully extending themselves almost. My watch said afterwards that my stride on the run was about a foot shorter than normal too. 

I still kept waking up last night. I was hopeful that my legs would feel better today, but they were still pretty tired and sluggish. I couldn't get them going any faster than 7 minute pace. I'm convinced this is probably a result of my shoes being worn out and my legs are therefore not able to recover from the pounding they are experiencing. I did 2 strides afterwards to try and get my legs back in check.

Based on how hard 7 minute pace felt on my 2.5 mile warmup, I wasn't sure how well my steady state effort was going to go, as they were still dragging. Once I got rolling though, I felt fairly good other than being warm. There would be moments of like 30 seconds where my legs would feel tired, but then it would go away. I did 45 minutes of steady state effort, and covered 7.58 miles in that time, which comes out to 5:56 average. The splits were 6:02, 6:04, 5:57, 5:57, 5:54, 5:54, 5:52, and 5:47 pace the last not full mile. An easy half mile cooldown back home.

Wasn't planning on the long run today before last night, so I was pretty happy with how this run went. It took me probably 5 miles before my feet and legs started to feel decent. It was probably around 8 miles in where I was able to pick the pace up a little as well. I had to stop at East Park to poop and then got a drink as well. On my way down 300 I ran into Fessler and ran with him back to his house. During the last four or so miles, my quads started to feel the microtears and tightened up some. My mouth was also dry at that point.

It was an early, easy run this morning. I averaged 6:57s, but I honestly couldn't have ran any faster than I did today. My right quad was in pretty bad shape and was hurting pretty bad by the end of the run. I didn't realize yesterdays microtears were so bad. I did some scouting for deer without any luck. I did see a fox on the small road though!