faster with age

     Another late PM run today but this time I finished just before it got completely dark. It had rained about an hour earlier so it was nice and cool. It rained lightly during the run a couple of times but was quite nice. I meant to run the whole run very easy [around 8:40 pace] but saw a couple of my neighbors riding their horses up the dirt road about 3/4 mile ahead of me. I had 2 miles to go before my turnaround and couldn't resist seeing if I could catch them first. I always seem to speed up to catch slow moving tractors or people going slow on bikes or anything I think I can catch and pass. I ran a 7:18 next mile and the first half of the next mile about the same pace. I caught and passed them and got too my turn around about 1/4 mile ahead of them. I then slowed it back down for the rest of the run. 8.25 miles @ 8:25/mile

     15 miles this morning at 8:04/mile up around the reservoir.

     I finally got my alfalfa in today. Between waiting for the ground to dry between rainstorms and other delays it seemed to take forever. Just as I finished this evening it started raining hard. Perfect timing except I hadn't run yet. I thought about going out in it but it was really coming down and I just didn't have the motivation. I just about bagged it all together but the rain finally stopped and I got out at 9:30 for a short one. I just ran 4 easy miles and threw in a few 10 to 15 second strides the last mile. During one of the strides something burst out from the thick ditch bank on the edge of a field and ran across the road 5 feet in front of me. It was dark enough I couldn't tell what it was but it sounded to heavy to be a cat. Then it ran across my neighbors driveway and triggered a motion sensor light and I could see it was a big old raccoon. I don't know if I've ever seen one run that fast. I must have startled him worse than he did me.

     We got about another 1/2 inch of rain this morning so I waited and did a PM run. It was nice out with the temp at 61 and a light breeze. I went out for a 4 mile out and back twice on my only stretch of pavement without going out to the highway. First four was a progression. 7:54,7:37,7:15,7:00 for an average pace of 7:26. Then 4 miles of tempo not shooting for any particular pace just run a comfortably hard pace. I ran 6:33, 6:31, 6:20, and 5:59. for an average pace of 6:20. The first 3 miles were what I wanted but there was nothing comfortable about the last mile. The last 3 miles were in 18:50. That's 6:16/mile pace which would be a 19:25 5K. I felt real good about this workout. 6:53 ave pace overall for 8 miles.

     Ran 8.5 recovery miles up to the reservoir. Nice day. 8:23 AP

     I didn't run until noon today and I can sure tell I'm not used to running in the heat. It was 65 deg when I got out and 72 at the end. It sure felt hotter than that. The slight headwind at the end was very welcome. I did the same run as yesterday but threw in a few strides the last 2 miles. Overall pace was 8:28.