5:00 am. Well I stayed true to my word and went outside this morning, luckily it was perfect running weather, a bit cool just standing around but perfect once I got moving. Today's "plan" was an 8 mile run w/6 miles @ 5:50 pace. So I set out down the river trail and crossed the bridge that my Monday's friend Alex showed me back on the other side of the river and back across the bridge to the hotel. I was hoping it was a 3 mile loop it ended up only being 2.6. So I took the first loop easy averaged 7:05 I think is what my Garmin said then I took off trying to keep a 5:50 pace, it was actually pretty easy with a good tail wind I probably averaged 5:45 the first mile, then across the bridge there was a probably 10 mph headwind which slowed me down to about 6:10 pace, plus going up and over bridge ramps kept slowing my pace down. Anyway I did that loop twice, plus a little further up the trail to end at an even 8 to make my tempo run 5.4 miles total in much slower than the goal pace, probably closer to 6:10. I was pretty disappointed that I had such a hard time keeping my pace up on for the most part an ideal flat course at sea level. I just wasn't totally all there today. This would be an absolute perfect 5K course if I could figure out an extra .5 miles. 9 miles in 59:20 total. 6:35 avg pace. Garmin's website is down so i can't get accurate tempo run times at the moment.
I doubt I will get out again, conference ends today so I will be working late to tear down and then I have a 7:30 am flight out tomorrow. Pretty good trip here to Portland, It's not quite as neat of a town as I had imagined for some reason, but there are a ton of pretty fast runners out early on the trail.
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