The Long Run

7.2 easy miles.  Although, as usual, warm and humid.  I'm hoping that 80º and  humid is good preparation for running in Las Vegas where it will be low 80's before the sun comes up but very low humidity.  No pain at all in the top of my foot.   Ran by myself today, there seem to be fewer people running on a regular basis these days between vacation plans and the less than ideal running conditions.

 Good run for a Monday morning, only one day off running since Saturday.
 

Average pace: 8:11 

Cross train day today.  Warm up on arc trainer (about 10 minutes) then 34 minutes on the rower.  I can remember when 20 minutes on the rower was difficult, now I just keep going.  Felt like I could have gone on a lot longer but today was not knock yourself out day :)

 A day off from the heat and humidity was also nice.

Based on what weather.com tells me, the heat humidity combo during the morning is equivalent to the higher heat / lower humidity combo of Las Vegas but I'll have to wait and find out for myself when I get there later this week.
 

6.1 Miles , average 8:06 pace.  Felt cooler out at start of the run for some reason even though thermometer read the same at beginning and end of the run - 80º

No pain whatsoever in my left foot today, either on the top of it or the big toe so I think I may have turned this one into just a close call.

7 miles tomorrow morning then off to Las Vegas to see how I do in the heat.  My wife will be competing in the Women's Tri-Fitness competition, she has been training very hard for this.  Once finished with that she'll get back to running and training for the Disney half marathon in January which she'll run with her Mom and 3 sisters. 

7.5 easy miles (about 8:14 pace).  Ran by myself at 5:30.   No one else had showed up, although I ran into some people about 3/4 through my run as they had started later in the morning.  They would have told me but thought I had left for vacation already :)

 Temp was warm (81 degrees) and humid as usual.  I think I'm getting used to these.
 

My first dry run :) This was one of my most challenging and rewarding runs. Everything felt different but it worked out fine. Running in Las Vegas! I woke up at 4:30 but fell back asleep until 4:52. Seeing how late it was I got moving quickly. I got into the car and drove out of town a little bit so I could run on the roads. I had spotted some roads that looked pretty good the day before. I was able to start my run at 5:30, already 86 degrees with the sun coming up. I took my water belt and carried a bottle in one hand.  The water belt has two 20 oz bottles which I usually don't take but instead put one 12 oz gatorade and one 16 oz water, but today used the two bigger bottles, one with water and one with Accelerade. 

The first 3 miles were very hard and I couldn't seem to go faster then 9:00. The first three miles were something like 9:50, 9:30, and 9:10.  But I figured that didn't matter. Eventually I was doing 8:30 miles. Once I got just past 7 miles I turned around. At that point the run got a lot easier. I realized I had been going up a slight incline the whole way. The run back was much easier due to running down a decline and carrying less and less weight.  I was doing miles between 7:35 and 7:40 the return trip with what seemed to be less effort on the way out. Final average was 8:13 pace.  1:02 to where I turned around at 7.1 miles, finish time at 14 miles was 1:54.