8 pathetic miles at 6:30am with my running group. Weather=80F, 85% humidity, sunny. So none of my normal running group was there this morning. Most of them met at 6am so they could do 18. The rest of them didn't run this morning b/c they are running El Scorcho 15 or 30 mile race that starts at midnight tonight. So the fastest group at the store was the 9:30 group. I ran with them for about 1/4 mile but I just didn't want to do 9:30... I am never going to get back in shape if I don't push it. I sped up but running by myself was less than motivating. I did 8:45 average miles 1-3. Mile 4 I picked it up to 8:30. Then my friend, Wendy, caught up to me. She was late to the store. She must have been running 8:00 or better to catch me. I started running with her. We did 8:20 mile 5. 8:36 mile 6. Wendy is in amazing shape... she runs 50 miles a week and lifts weights and does bootcamp. (no kids!) So she's just talking away cuz 8:30 is soooo slow which is ok because she's doing El Scorcho tonight. She's asking me all these questions and it starts getting really hard for me to answer them and run this pace. I tell her at the water stop at mile 6 that I can either stop talking, put in my iPod, and go 8:00-8:20 back to the store (2 miles to go)... or I can keep talking but I'd have to slow down cuz I'm out of shape and talking and 8:30 is hard for me. Wendy said, "let's talk". So mile 7 and 8 were 9:00/m. I felt like a failure when another girl passed us. I'm so slow! My stomach and upper legs are soft too. I only gained 5 pounds these last 2 months of not running but my body lost so much muscle that is replaced with "softness" ... Still look skinny, but I am NOT tone. Grrr... I'm mad that I let this happen. My friend Melissa came running up when I was at the store. She just finished a 12 miler with her brother. They said they ran "slow" for the first half but then sped up for the last 7 miles to half marathon race pace...which averaged to be 7:30/m, 7:20 the last mile. Now I'm really jealous! I ran with them last year... that sounded like something I could have done last year.... I'm so determined to get back in shape! I've got plans to run tonight and tomorrow morning. I guess I should at least be glad I am injury free. Gotta stay that way and be patient with my pace as I build milage back up. ---------------------------- 7pm run 5.5 miles pushing Ryan in the running stroller. Went to Trinity Park to run a couple of El Scorcho laps with my friend Mario who was starting at 7pm and going to run until 7am. The real race doesn't start until mid-night. Most people finish the 50K (30 miles) by sun up. Mario is crazy! He had a good plan though. He was keeping his pace at 11:00/m until 1-2 am, at which point he said he might get faster. He's got people delivering him food at certain times too. People camp out and spectate all night. It's kind of like a party atmosphere in the park. I hear it's a lot of fun. I can't go because of my kids. Maybe another year. So I ran 2 miles at 9:30 pace by myself trying to figure out where in the park they were camped out and 3.5 miles with Mario at 11:00 pace. We had to leave because Ryan was getting tired. That 11:00 pace did feel nice though... I swear I could have done it all night.
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