Larry, Wayne, and I ran the water tank hills this morning. It was another beautiful morning. My legs are feeling the effects of the increased mileage, but feeling stronger at the same time. The knee pain has continued to fade. I plan to run at noon as usual for a Wednesday, but I'm not sure I'm going to be able to keep up. My legs aren't used to these 10 mile days. I survived the noon run, barely. After all these months of waiting for warmer weather, today was the first day it felt too warm during a run and I found myself wishing for slightly cooler weather. The warmer weather was only one of the challenges today, the pace was the other. Once again, Tom only wanted to go four easy miles, so the first two miles were okay at 8:44 and 8:15. Nathan wanted to go longer and a little faster, and I agreed to try to hang with him. Tom turned back part way into mile three, which Nathan and I finished in 7:54, still pretty reasonable. We then went to 7:40 for mile four, then 7:23 for mile five. I had had enough by mile six and finally convinced Nathan to cut me loose. He quickly pulled away then came back near the end to run in with me. I finished mile six in 7:47, and then we finished the last 0.2 together. Nathan then hit the treadmill for a couple of more miles.
I was pleased to be able to run a 7:23 mile in the heat with my legs feeling as tired as they do. Also, this was not an all out run, more of a marathon pace effort. I got plenty hot and tired, but it feels good to feel like a runner again.
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