Sunday Run-Day

This past Sunday I ran 6 miles for the first time this year. Despite running at sundown, the heat from the humidity was still pretty oppressive. As mentioned in my previous post for marathon training, I plan to incrementally add about a mile to my long run each week while maintaining at least one and one medium run for a total of 3-4 runs per week. Last week I did 5 miles on the 5th of July. Next week I may try running early in the morning - 7 miles at 7 am sounds nice anyways. Whatever you need to do to get that mental edge and make it fun, it's worth a shot!

Another important aspect that I realized in my run was that I need at least 2 hours of fasting prior to my run and that eating a particularly large, heavy meal can weigh one down. Prior to the run I made a vegetable and plant-based chick'n thai red curry over brown rice but ate such a large portion that I still felt a bit bloated by the time I was lacing up. Normally this would be an excellent meal to fuel and sustain a run as it's high in carbs and also has a good amount of protein but I ate entirely too much of it and didn't quite give myself a full 2 hours prior to running. By mile 3 I could tell that my stomach wasn't happy with my decision but fortunately I managed to keep everything down and my pace didn't suffer too much. It was still a good insight that I decided to make note of so as to make my next long run a little easier.

In summary, even a hot and bloated run still counts as long as you get the miles in - making it fun and not dwelling much on the negative aspects during the run is key. At the end of the day, it's just about putting one foot in front of the other and choosing to go!