The Long Run

Now I remember why the long run is such a pain (literally and figuratively). This morning as my Father's Day present to myself, I let the wife and kids sleep in as usual and hit the roads around 7:15 am. My usual Sunday run is 2.5 miles to the local park and then out and back on a paved, measured trail before concluding with 2.5 miles to my home.

The out portion is mostly downhill, which means the return trip is uphill and doubly tiring. I decided to try and run 15 miles and so ran the out portion at a relaxed clip. There's nothing worse then getting carried away on a long run and running too fast on the out/downhill portion only to realize you're out of gas with still too many uphill miles to go.

The return trip was a bit tiring both physically and mentally because I knew I had a ways to go. For some reason I always run the return part faster, even with the hills, which ends up making the run harder.

The less few miles were a struggle, mostly because I wasn't used to being on my feet that long. I ended up running 15.2 miles in 1:56:41, which was my longest run since early January. I guess I'll need to get used to going longer if I want to run a marathon in December. I'm definitlely not looking forward to the this.

At least I got the run out of the way before 9:30. However, there was no time to relax and recover. My kids wanted French Toast for breakfast and my wife wanted no part of it. Happy Father's Day!