An evolved run. Ideally I would have run 8 miles outdoors up Common Wealth Ave in Boston at 8:20ish pace through the hills. However, there was a lot of black ice and my right piriformis is really flared up from this weekend's long run in the snow and yesterday's tempo. I decided to give my piriformis and the hills a break and try an easy progression pyramid run on the tm to be safe. I started with a 9:40 min/mi pace!!! My piriformis is soooo tight. I did extra dynamic stretching but that didn't seem to help. 0.1 mile in I thought seriously about bailing, I was having pain on the level of 9 out of 10 and it was altering my gait. I stuck with it though and it started to ease up. I decided to drop my pace every 0.5 mile 0.1 MPH, then by mile 4 slow 0.1 MPH until I hit 8 miles. Well, by mile 4 I started feeling soooo much better so I decided not to slow my pace. Instead, stuck to a full progression and ended with 7:47 min/mi pace for my last half mile. Lessons learned: - The faster I ran, the more my pain subsided probably because I was stretching my legs at faster paces. - My hill work is making me stronger than I realize, I felt stronger than I ever have post-marathon (and I kept running into the handle bar throughout the run even at sub 8 pace, haha). This was a easy to moderate workout. I think it was just what I needed all things considered. I should recover nicely for my speed work tomorrow, I came away with much of the pain from my piriformis choking my sciatica gone. Time to pigeon like there's no tomorrow! :) | 